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- Mar 22, 2010
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Ready and eager to transition from opposing health care reform to targeting the members of Congress who made it happen, tea party organizers find themselves grappling instead with reports of ugly behavior at this weekends protests in Washington that could stymie efforts to broaden the movements appeal.
While the thousands of tea partiers who thronged the Capitol grounds on short notice in advance of Sundays House health care vote were proof of the movements continuing energy, their impact was undercut by accounts of racist and homophobic epithets directed at Democratic lawmakers by a handful of individuals among this weekends crowd.
Tea party organizers have struggled in recent months to clamp down on fringe elements that have sprung up around and sometimes within the movement, including white supremacists and conspiracy theorists who believe that the government played a role in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks (truthers) or that President Barack Obama was not born in the United States and is therefore ineligible to be president (birthers).
Some tea party and GOP leaders quickly denounced the slurs shouted at House Democrats, pointed out they were not representative of most tea partiers and urged protestors to stay focused on the movements core issues of limited government and taxation. Others suggested either that reporters and lawmakers had fabricated the incidents, or said the epithets came from tea party opponents who had infiltrated the crowds. Some even demanded apologies from Democrats who they said falsely accused them.
Regardless of who yelled what, the reports themselves could be problematic for the tea party movement, said Adam Brandon, a spokesman for FreedomWorks, the small government group that helped organize tea partiers congressional office visits last week.
Tattoos last forever, said Brandon, quoting his boss, FreedomWorks chairman and former House Republican Leader Dick Armey. If the movement gets tattooed as at all sympathetic to those (racist and homophobic) views, I wont want to be involved in it anymore. Its very distracting not only to our side but also to the debate and the country.
Jenny Beth Martin, an Atlanta-based leader of the influential national umbrella group Tea Party Patriots, has played something of a self-policing role at tea party events, including last weekends rallies, urging protesters not to engage with counter demonstrators who at times confronted tea partiers.
Of the reported epithets, she said, we do not allow that kind of thing to happen within our events because it is wrong and were not going to put up with it. I dont think its good for any movement to have reports of crazy people doing things like that. More than the movement, I dont think its good for America for that kind of thing to happen. Pointing to her groups denunciation of a self-proclaimed tea party leader photographed with a racist sign, Martin said if we saw that kind of thing happening, we would kick the people out. We have a history of doing that.
House Democrats expressed outrage at the treatment some of them received over the weekend, and signaled they will make it an issue for the tea party movements Republican allies. Referring to this crazy stuff the Republicans are doing here, House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.), said GOP leaders ought to be ashamed of themselves for bringing these people here to Washington, D.C., and they're acting like this.
Source: Politico
While the thousands of tea partiers who thronged the Capitol grounds on short notice in advance of Sundays House health care vote were proof of the movements continuing energy, their impact was undercut by accounts of racist and homophobic epithets directed at Democratic lawmakers by a handful of individuals among this weekends crowd.
Tea party organizers have struggled in recent months to clamp down on fringe elements that have sprung up around and sometimes within the movement, including white supremacists and conspiracy theorists who believe that the government played a role in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks (truthers) or that President Barack Obama was not born in the United States and is therefore ineligible to be president (birthers).
Some tea party and GOP leaders quickly denounced the slurs shouted at House Democrats, pointed out they were not representative of most tea partiers and urged protestors to stay focused on the movements core issues of limited government and taxation. Others suggested either that reporters and lawmakers had fabricated the incidents, or said the epithets came from tea party opponents who had infiltrated the crowds. Some even demanded apologies from Democrats who they said falsely accused them.
Regardless of who yelled what, the reports themselves could be problematic for the tea party movement, said Adam Brandon, a spokesman for FreedomWorks, the small government group that helped organize tea partiers congressional office visits last week.
Tattoos last forever, said Brandon, quoting his boss, FreedomWorks chairman and former House Republican Leader Dick Armey. If the movement gets tattooed as at all sympathetic to those (racist and homophobic) views, I wont want to be involved in it anymore. Its very distracting not only to our side but also to the debate and the country.
Jenny Beth Martin, an Atlanta-based leader of the influential national umbrella group Tea Party Patriots, has played something of a self-policing role at tea party events, including last weekends rallies, urging protesters not to engage with counter demonstrators who at times confronted tea partiers.
Of the reported epithets, she said, we do not allow that kind of thing to happen within our events because it is wrong and were not going to put up with it. I dont think its good for any movement to have reports of crazy people doing things like that. More than the movement, I dont think its good for America for that kind of thing to happen. Pointing to her groups denunciation of a self-proclaimed tea party leader photographed with a racist sign, Martin said if we saw that kind of thing happening, we would kick the people out. We have a history of doing that.
House Democrats expressed outrage at the treatment some of them received over the weekend, and signaled they will make it an issue for the tea party movements Republican allies. Referring to this crazy stuff the Republicans are doing here, House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.), said GOP leaders ought to be ashamed of themselves for bringing these people here to Washington, D.C., and they're acting like this.
Source: Politico
