Three men who were involved in the early stages of planning of the National Tea Party Convention — but who eventually resigned over disagreements with the organizers — showed up to the event Saturday and blasted its organizers over a number of issues, including its emphasis on top-down leadership.
Tennessee Tea Party Coalition member Mark Herr, along with Anthony Shreeve and Robert Kilmarx, said the convention’s high-ticket prices kept the average grassroots activist from being able to attend.
“I just can’t afford to come,” he said just steps from the convention’s ballrooms at the Gaylord Opryland Resort.
The critics are now part of the Tennessee Tea Party Coalition, a loosely aligned network of Tennessee based Tea Party groups consisting of 34 groups and 18,000 members, Herr said.
Herr also criticized yesterday’s announcement by convention organizers Judson Phillips and Mark Skoda that they would be forming Ensuring Liberty corporation, which will include a political action committee that will support Republican candidates across the country. Herr said the movement should not pledge to only support Republicans.
Asked about the critics, convention organizer Judson Phillips “go ask the people here if it is grassroots.”
Phillips said the convention was meant for leaders — and not grassroots activists — and that’s why the ticket prices and extravagances at a luxurious Nashville resort were appropriate.
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