Tea Party movement could hold key to 2010 elections

BY CHUCK RAASCH • Gannett • December 30, 2009

WASHINGTON -- Is the Tea Party movement with the Republicans or against them?

That could be the most important question of the 2010 House, Senate and gubernatorial elections. The anti-tax, smaller-government movement -- which built momentum in town-hall meetings all across the country in 2009 -- already is backing candidates in top-shelf Senate races from Florida to Nevada and is actively seeking others.

"You will see it all across the country," predicted Joe Wierzbicki, a spokesman for the Tea Party movement. "It won't be in every race. But there is a lot of difference between the Republican Party and the Tea Party."

But if their candidates do not win Republican primaries, will Tea Party activists support their own third-party candidates in the fall elections, prompting what Republican strategist Bill McInturff conceded would be a "disaster" for the GOP? Will their supporters simply not vote? Or could their movement, born of concern over government spending even when Republicans were in control, end up taking down incumbents of all political stripes?

"Right now the Tea Party movement has higher favorables (in polls) than either the Democratic Party or the Republican Party," said Democratic pollster Fred Yang. "Eleven months from now, the enemy could be all of us."

Bridges were burned between the GOP and the Tea Party protesters when the movement began. Some activists, including Wierzbicki, still smart at criticism leveled by top Republicans, including Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele, at radio talk-show host Rush Limbaugh. Many Tea Party activists view Limbaugh as the most consistent voice against President Barack Obama's policies.

Then the two sides split further in an obscure New York House race in November, with Tea Party activists and some national politicians, including former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, supporting a conservative outsider, while establishment Republicans backed a state legislator whose views on issues such as taxes and abortion rights conflicted with the GOP platform. Both sides blamed the other when Democrats picked up the historically Republican seat.

There have been efforts to rebuild bridges, Wierzbicki said in an interview, citing Rep. Michelle Bachmann, R-Minn., as a liaison whom Tea Party activists trust.

The movement has another round of national protests planned for the spring, including a national caravan that will launch in April in Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid's hometown of Searchlight, Nev.

Wierzbicki draws parallels to how Democrats aligned with the anti-war movement, but he said it remains to be seen whether Republicans are willing to go "shoulder-to-shoulder" with the Tea Partiers.

"The difference is that the Democratic leadership and the Democratic Party did not go ahead and malign the anti-war movement," Wierzbicki said. "They may have disagreed with them. But with Michael Steele and others, there was a deliberate effort to declare war on the Tea Party movement."

Some Republican strategists are advising their candidates to do what GOP pollster Ed Goeas called "hug and shrug" -- embracing and agreeing that in the end, the goals are the same, irrespective of the early splits.