CNN

The GOP has declined in part because conservatives have targeted moderates, Sen. Arlen Specter says.

WASHINGTON (CNN) - Veteran Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter said Sunday that he hopes his recent switch to the Democratic Party will serve as a "wake-up call" to an increasingly conservative GOP.

He also once again assigned some blame for the recent decline of the Republican Party to the political advocacy group Club for Growth, which targets moderate GOP incumbents who do not adhere to the doctrine of supply-side economics.

Club for Growth fought Specter's GOP renomination in 2004 and was set to oppose him again in the 2010 primary.

"It would be my hope ... that this would be a wake-up call and the [GOP] would move for a broader big tent like we had under Reagan," Specter said on CBS's "Face the Nation."

"The party has changed so much since I was elected in 1980," he said.

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