March 26, 2010: Tea Party Leaders Say Organizations Do Not Tolerate Racism, Reports of Such Are Invented by ‘Liberals’

Tea party leaders angrily deny that their movement has any tolerance for racism and anti-Semitism, and say that accusations of this are attempts by “liberals” to “marginalize” the movement. Any incidents of racist or anti-Semitic sloganeering or other activities, they say, are isolated and not tolerated by the organizations themselves (see February 18, 2009, August 1, 2009, August 4, 2009, August 4, 2009, August 6, 2009, August 11, 2009, September 2009, September 14, 2009, March 16, 2010, March 20, 2010, March 24-25, 2010, May 14, 2010, July 14, 2010, July 15, 2010, July 23, 2010, August 6, 2010, September 11, 2010, September 12, 2010, and April 15, 2011). Sal Russo, chief strategist of the Tea Party Express, says: “Liberals and Democrats, with help from their friends in the media, have tried to marginalize the tea party movement. First they said [the tea party movement] was AstroTurf, that these weren’t real people (see March 13, 2009 and After, April 2009 and After, April 6-13, 2009, April 8, 2009, April 14, 2009, April 15, 2009, April 16, 2009, July 23, 2009, July 24, 2009, August 4, 2009, August 4, 2009, August 5, 2009, August 6, 2009, August 6-7, 2009, August 10, 2009, August 10, 2009, August 11, 2009, August 28, 2009, July 3-4, 2010, August 30, 2010, and September 20, 2010).… Then they said it’s just a bunch of crackpots, and they would go out and find the oddest person in the crowd. Now they’re using race. But the attempts to vilify this movement is what you’d expect. It’s not going to work with the tea party.” Tea party leaders say that recent reports of harassment, threats, and vandalism of Democratic lawmakers by opponents of the Obama administration’s health care reform initiative (see August 5, 2009, August 5, 2009, August 6, 2009, August 6, 2009, August 10, 2009, March 20, 2010, and March 24-25, 2010) are isolated incidents that have nothing to do with their organizations; House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA) says he has also received hateful emails and telephone messages, but has chosen not to publicize them. Cantor has previously said that someone fired a bullet into his Richmond office, an event that local police will determine was a ricochet and not fired directly at his office. As to suggestions that Republican lawmakers such as himself have encouraged their supporters to harass or threaten Democrats, Cantor says, “Any suggestion that a leader in this body would incite threats or acts against other members is akin to saying that I would endanger myself, my wife, or my children.” However, Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) says he and others were singled out by Cantor, and have received death threats and harassing emails and telephone calls, including some from people identifying themselves as tea party members. Senate Sergeant at Arms Terry Gainer has told reporters that there is “no evidence that annoying, harassing, or threatening telephone calls or emails are coordinated.” Dale Robertson of TeaParty.org says that he believes the reports of tea partiers vilifying or spitting on Democratic lawmakers are lies concocted by Democrats: “These people could be anybody. I wouldn’t put it past the Democrats to plant somebody there. They’re trying to label the tea party, but I’ve never seen any racial slurs.” In February 2009, Robertson was photographed holding a sign at a tea party rally in Houston bearing a racial slur (see February 27, 2009). [Washington Independent, 1/4/2010; Washington Times, 3/26/2010; Mediaite, 3/26/2010]