Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Grass roots or not, Nevada tea parties had assist

Conservative activists stop in Las Vegas along cross-country tour

Tea Party Express

Justin M. Bowen

Sharron Angle, a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, speaks during a “Tea Party Express” rally Aug. 31 at the Las Vegas Sports Center.

Tea Party Express (8-31-09)

Sharron Angle, a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, speaks during a Launch slideshow »

The organization that was unable to accomplish its sole objective in 2008 — to stop Barack Obama from becoming president — rolled into town Monday for a do-over of sorts.

The Republican-backed group led by conservative Californians whipped up opposition to Obama’s agenda in Nevada as it continued a 16-day, cross-country Tea Party Express tour.

The group funded by the Our Country Deserves Better political action committee raises the question: When does an “Astro Turf” political campaign become a real grass-roots uprising?

You may remember the Our Country Deserves Better PAC from last fall’s presidential election. The organization headed by Howard Kaloogian, a former California legislator who ran unsuccessfully for Congress in 2006, developed some of the more damning TV ads during the presidential election, including those questioning Obama’s patriotism and his missing American flag lapel pin.

Kaloogian’s group raised $1.4 million in the 2008 election cycle to defeat Obama, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

But after Obama went on to win Nevada by 12 percentage points — a victory margin not seen since Franklin Delano Roosevelt — the group is back, having raised $585,000 so far this year to accomplish in public opinion what it was unable to do at the polls.

So was this grass-roots activism or hired hands rousing the crowd of hundreds?

“This thing is so organic and so spontaneous and so grass roots that it’s like trying to herd feral cats,” Tea Party Express Vice Chairman Mark Williams, a radio talk show host, told Fox News Monday morning.

The cable news network has been heavily promoting the Tea Party Express, which swung through Northern Nevada over the weekend, since before its Friday launch. Fox has run ads asking viewers, “Will You Join the Tea Party Express?” Also, a Fox producer is blogging and shooting video at each stop of the tour for conservative commentator Sean Hannity.

The tour has also been promoted by Conservatives for Patients’ Rights, which was heavily involved in filling rowdy town-hall meetings on health care this summer.

That group’s founder, Rick Scott, is a millionaire investor and controversial former hospital executive, who spent $5 million of his own money to bankroll ads opposing Obama’s health care reform package, according to The Washington Post. The ads were developed by the same firm that did the “Swift boat” campaign in 2004 against the Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts.

In Nevada, Our Country Deserves Better sent 7,000 e-mails and promoted the Las Vegas event on the program of conservative talk radio host Heidi Harris as well as on Fox News, spokesman Levi Russell said.

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Rolls of toilet paper are shown for sale during the "Tea Party Express" rally Monday at the Las Vegas Sports Center.

The group had two-fer on its agenda in the Silver State: Go after Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who is seeking reelection in 2010.

Republican Party activists in Nevada, piqued by rumors of national media attention for the event, dashed off the e-mails to draw crowds.

Several hundred people responded, gathering in the parking lot of the Sports Center of Las Vegas, on Sunset Road near Las Vegas Boulevard, to wave signs and flags and listen to the busload of conservative activists.

Among the speakers were several potential Republican candidates in 2010, including former state Sen. Joe Heck, who is planning a primary challenge against fellow Republican Gov. Jim Gibbons, and potential Reid challengers, including former Assemblywoman Sharron Angle and businessman Danny Tarkanian.

Las Vegas resident Sue Heiselman, a political independent, said she has soured on both of Nevada’s senators, Reid and Republican John Ensign. “I’m here for my grandkids,” she said. “We’re venting simply because we feel like we have nowhere else to go.”

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Hundreds participate in the "Tea Party Express" rally Monday at the Las Vegas Sports Center. The Tea Party Express is organizing rallies in several cities to voice its opposition to the policies of President Barack Obama, Sen. Harry Reid and other leaders.

The Nevada Democratic Party said the Tea Party Express’ swing through the state is “absolutely not grass roots.”

“This is classic Astro Turfing,” party spokeswoman Phoebe Sweet said. The Democrats were holding a competing event in the evening at UNLV with Reid headlining a rally in support of proposed health care reform.

Of the Tea Party supporters who showed up Saturday in Winnemucca, one carried an “I will not be a socialist” sign, another wore the group’s signature T-shirt: Obama in white face painted to look like the Joker character in the Batman film “The Dark Knight.”

Barbara and Pete Jones of Reno told CNN they aren’t “protesting people,” but felt moved to drive to Winnemucca for the Tea Party Express event. “We’re the silent majority that is no longer silent,” she said.

Lisa Mascaro reported from Washington. Michael J. Mishak and Las Vegas Sun reporter Jeremy Twitchell, who contributed, reported from Las Vegas.

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