NOT JUST FLORIDA…. There was something of a coup within the Republican Party of Florida this week, with right-wing activists forcing the resignation of the state party’s chairman, whom the base considered insufficiently conservative.
It’s worth keeping in mind, though, that the fight that played out in the Sunshine State may be the first of many.
A founder of the “tea party” movement said Wednesday he had a warning for Republican state leaders: Back conservative candidates or else other states will suffer the same backlash that toppled Florida’s Republican Party chairman this week.
“We are turning our guns on anyone who doesn’t support constitutional conservative candidates,” said Dale Robertson, who operates TeaParty.org out of Houston and helped start the movement nearly two years ago.
He declined to say which states are next on the tea party’s hit list. He said party leaders in those states would be warned privately, but the movement’s wrath “will be very clear publicly” if they don’t listen.
“If they continue to do things like they did in Florida, it’s not going to be good for them,” Mr. Robertson said. “If they don’t get that, and their party chairmen don’t get that, they are going to be ostracized.”
If Dale Robertson’s name sounds familiar, it’s because he was photographed last year at a Tea Party rally holding a sign that read, “Congress = Slaveowner, Taxpayer = Niggar.”
And now he’s warning state Republican Parties to be more right-wing — or else.
It’s quite a movement.
