February 5, 2010
US Tea Party 'revolution' threatened by discord
Tea party protest in Flagstaff, Arizona
Tim Reid in Nashville
With its 2,800 rooms, fountains, indoor palm trees and expensive restaurants, the Gaylord Opryland Resort seems a strange venue for the first national convention of the Tea Party, which spends its time railing against big-spending government.
It seems odd to some delegates, too. After a year in which this populist, conservative grassroots movement has helped to inflict a string of electoral defeats on President Obama’s Democrats, the sumptuous inaugural gathering is in danger of splitting the Tea Partiers, rather than uniting them.
As 600 delegates arrived last night for the two-day convention, with a speech by Sarah Palin tomorrow evening as its keynote event, the anti-establishment revolution was beset by internecine battles.
Several Tea Party groups decided to boycott the event. They object to each delegate being charged $549 (£350) per ticket, and an additional $349 to attend a steak and lobster banquet while Mrs Palin, the former Alaskan governor and vice-presidential candidate, speaks. Then there is the small matter of the $100,000 being paid to Mrs Palin. “That’s a lot of damned tea,” one delegate griped. She promised to spend her fee on campaigns, candidates and issues.
The most offensive part about the convention, the Tea Party boycotters say, is that the group organising it, Tea Party Nation Inc, is a for-profit business run by two Tennessee lawyers, a husband and wife called Judson and Sherry Phillips. One right-wing blogger, Dan Riehl, accused Mr Phillips of wanting to become a Tea Party millionaire.
Philip Glass, the head of the National Precinct Alliance, which has pulled out of the convention, said: “There’s just a tremendous amount of anger about the ticket price.”
Mark Skoda, a spokesman and delegate, said: “When you want to have the appropriate venue and appropriate security to handle an event of this nature you need somewhere like the Gaylord. The cost includes everybody’s food and all other amenities. We haven’t forced anyone to pay, and we haven’t asked for subsidies or bailouts.”
The Tea Party movement arrived on the scene last winter with nationwide protests against Mr Obama’s $787 billion stimulus Bill, bailout of the US car industry and size of government. As the year progressed, the loose confederation held thousands of rallies and disrupted politicians’ town hall meetings, directing their most vocal opposition against healthcare reform.
At the time, the Democrats dismissed them as fringe obsessives.
Not any more. Just ask the White House. The Tea Party movement has harnessed a sweeping anti-Washington, anti-incumbent mood, an anger that has had a role in a series of recent Democratic election defeats, most notably the loss of the Massachusetts Senate seat. That ended Mr Obama’s 60-seat filibuster-proof majority in the upper chamber and all but destroyed his hopes of historic health legislation.
Scott Brown, the winning Republican, was sworn in yesterday.
The movement, named after the 1773 anti-colonial revolt in Boston, has no central command or organisation. Yet it has attracted a mix of grassroots conservatives, libertarians, independents and even disaffected Democrats.
Moderate Republicans are fearful of them. Tea Partiers have been throwing money and time behind conservative candidates to challenge party incumbents deemed not conservative enough.
Their efforts have even left John McCain, the 2008 Republican presidential candidate, facing a stiff primary challenge from a Tea Party-backed challenger in Arizona. In Florida, Charlie Crist, the once-popular Governor running for the Senate, has fallen behind in the polls to Marco Rubio, a Republican challenger and darling of the Tea Partiers.
So this first effort at a national gathering in Nashville comes at a critical moment for the Tea Party. Can it continue to harness the anti-big spending anger and its loosely affiliated nature into a stronger, more coherent political force? Or could it destroy itself amid infighting and a lack of central command?
The Tea Party Express, which took to the road this summer, boycotted the meeting, as did FreedomWorks. The groups were already accused of being too close to the Republican establishment. The Express group also fell out with the Tea Party Patriots. The American Liberty Alliance said that it withdrew as a sponsor.
Two prominent conservative congresswomen, Michelle Bachman and Marsha Blackburn, also pulled out. They said that they still supported the movement but were worried about congressional ethics rules involving for-profit events.
Mrs Palin wrote on Wednesday that, as with all grassroots efforts, the nature of the movement meant that sometimes the debates were loud and the organization was messier than that of a polished, controlled machine. Some Tea Partiers complain that Mrs Palin is too much of an establishment figure to address them and is hijacking the movement.
Still, the event promises much. The opening reception today features music by Ray Stevens, the 71-year-old country musician whose We The People (“You vote Obamacare, We’re gonna vote you outta there”), has become a Tea Party anthem. He will be joined by Lisa Mei Norton, a retired air force sergeant who will perform A Revolution’s Brewin’.
There will be speeches such as “Defeating liberalism via the primary process” and “Why Christians must engage”. Ana Puig, a Brazilian-born US citizen, will compare Mr Obama to Latin America’s Marxist dictators.
In a bar in town, the Nashville Democratic Party will hold a happy hour at 5pm called Anything But Tea.
