Eric Wargotz, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate against Democratic incumbent Barbara A. Mikulski, has lined up his campaign team for the general election.

The campaign director and general consultant is Bo Harmon. Bo knows Maryland, having managed Bob Ehrlich's 2006 re-election campaign for governor.

The day-to-day manager will be Demetrios Karoutsos, who recently ran conservative businessman Rob Fisher's Republican primary effort in Maryland's first congressional district.

Harmon's firm, Response America of Alexandria, Va., says on its website that it specializes in fundraising and voter contact direct marketing for Republican candidates and right-of-center, nonprofit organizations. Its impressive current client list includes the Republican National Committee, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, and the National Republican Congressional Committee, as well as Ohio Rep. John Boehner, who would become House speaker if Republicans gain control of the chamber in the 2010 midterm elections, and Florida Senate candidate Marco Rubio, a tea party favorite.

The Republican strategist, who was voter contact director of John McCain's '08 presidential campaign, signed up last year with the political action committee of Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, a likely 2012 Republican presidential contender.

A formal announcement of the Wargotz campaign brain trust is expected early in the week. The Queen Anne's County commissioner, making his first statewide run, finished first in last week's 11-way Republican Senate primary.