Tea Party Protests - Reports of Abusive Behavior

Reports of Abusive Behavior

There have been allegations of racism and other abusive behavior by Tea Party protesters.

On March 16, 2010, at a Tea Party protest at the Ohio offices of Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy, a counter-protester with Parkinson's disease was berated by one of the protestors and had dollar bills thrown at him with additional protesters also mocking the individual. The man initially denied the incident, but later apologized for his "shameful" actions.

On March 20, 2010, it was reported that protesters against proposed health care reform used racial and anti-gay slurs. Gay Congressman Barney Frank was called a "faggot." Several African-American lawmakers said demonstrators shouted "the N-word" at them. Congressman André Carson said while he was walking down the steps of the Cannon House Office Building with Representative John Lewis and chief of staff, amid chants of "Kill the bill," he heard the "n-word" fifteen times. Representative Emanuel Cleaver said he walked several yards behind Lewis and distinctly heard "nigger." Cleaver was also spat upon by a protester while walking up the stairs of the Cannon Building, although whether the spitting was intentional has been questioned. Recounting the incident weeks later, Carson quoted Lewis as saying: "You know, this reminds me of a different time."

Conservative commentator Andrew Breitbart said the racial slurs and other allegations by Cleaver, Lewis and Carson were fabricated as part of a plan to annihilate the Tea Party movement by all means necessary and that they never actually happened. He offered to donate $10,000 to the United Negro College Fund if Lewis could provide audio or video footage of the slurs, or pass a lie detector test. The amount was later raised to $100,000 for "hard evidence." In addition, the National Tea Party Federation sent a letter to the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) denouncing racism and requesting that the CBC supply any evidence of the alleged events at the protest.

Representative Heath Shuler of North Carolina backed up his colleagues, telling the Hendersonville (N.C.) Times-News that he too heard slurs. "It was the most horrible display of protesting I have ever seen in my life ... It breaks your heart that the way they display their anger is to spit on a member and use that kind of language," Shuler said. Three weeks later, after the issue of whether the N-word was used had turned into a political battle, Shuler changed his story and told the Associated Press that he heard slurs used against Barney Frank, but not Cleaver. Politicians from both political parties, black conservative activists and columnists have argued that allegations of racism do not reflect the movement as a whole.

One of Representative Anthony Weiner’s staffers reported a stream of hostile encounters with tea partiers roaming the halls of Congress. In addition to mockery, protesters left a couple of notes behind. According to the New York Daily News, one letter "asked what Rahm Emanuel did with Weiner in the shower, in a reference to the mess around ex-Rep Eric Massa. It was signed with a swastika, the staffer said. The other note called the congressman "Schlomo Weiner."