Angle Allows Group Expelled by National Tea Party to Continue Fundraising for Her
As more and more national Republicans – and even other Tea Party groups such as the Tea Party Federation – distance themselves from the Tea Party Express, Sharron Angle continues to cozy up with the group whose public face has been widely condemned for his latest racist rant.
Earlier this year, Tea Party Express Spokesman Mark Williams stood next to Angle as she received the Tea Party Express endorsement, and Angle hasn’t tried to put any distance between them since.
On Sunday, the Tea Party Express sent out a fundraising email to supporters asking them to donate to Angle, the GOP Senate candidate for whom they’ve spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on ads, or to make direct contributions to the Express to “help us get on the airwaves with our pro-Angle TV ads.”
The fundraiser came just one day after the national Tea Party Federation expelled the Tea Party Express and spokesman Mark Williams following the release of an offensive and supposedly satirical letter he penned from the NAACP to Abraham Lincoln. The letter repeatedly used the word “colored” and said the people the NAACP represent “strive for” welfare and “don’t cotton to that whole emancipation thing.”
Eugene Robinson of the Washington Post called the letter “hate speech.”
A spokesman for the Tea Party Federation called the letter “clearly offensive.”
And even national Republicans sought to distance themselves from the Express, and from Williams and his history of racist comments and blog posts.
In fact, some Republicans are distancing themselves from the Tea Party and a planned Tea Party caucus proposed by Rep. Michelle Bachman and GOP Senate candidate Rand Paul altogether.
Even former Senate Republican Leader Trent Lott has said a big contingent of Tea Party types will make the Senate harder to run, citing the anti-establishment example of South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint. “We don't need a lot of Jim DeMint disciples,” Lott said.
And Sen. John Cornyn, chairman of the Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee offered this rousing endorsement of the Tea Party’s chosen candidates, such as Angle: “The candidates are not ours to choose,” he said.
So, with support for the Tea Party in general in question by mainstream Republicans and support for the Tea Party Express eroding even amongst Tea Party devotees, will Angle finally back away from the Express and from Williams and his racist screeds?
Will she give back the $5,000 she’s taken from the Tea Party Express and any donations they’ve helped her raise?
And will she stop leaning on them for help fundraising and for hundreds of thousands of dollars in television ads on her behalf?
“Angle has yet to even comment on Mark Williams’ deplorable writings, let alone put any distance between herself and a group that condones this kind of racist rant,” said Phoebe Sweet, communications director with the Nevada State Democratic Party. “Instead the Tea Party Express continues to raise funds for Angle while she sits silently by, tacitly endorsing Williams’ racism as it is roundly excoriated by the mainstream, by Republicans and even by Tea Partiers themselves. This is just the latest example of how extreme and out of touch Sharron Angle is with the average voter.”