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Tea Partiers to FEC: Give Us Donor Secrecy, Just Like Socialists

Those on the right are hoping to score FEC privileges currently granted to those on the left

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A 2009 Tea Party protest in Nashville, Tennessee

A 2009 Tea Party protest in Nashville, Tennessee • vutorch.com

Tea Partiers are telling the federal government that much like their ideological rivals the socialists, they're an unloved group of folks in need of protection from public and private targeting.

The Socialist Workers Party has long relied upon Federal Election Commission rules allowing the group to keep its donor list private. Now Tea Partiers are claiming they face a similar level of harassment - citing the recent IRS scandal as evidence - and want the right to keep their donor list secret too.

"As we very thoroughly document at almost three times the length of the socialist request, tea party supporters are subject to an unprecedented level of harassment and abuse," said Dan Backer, an attorney for the Tea Party Leadership Fund who claims that those for whom he speaks face "widespread and ingrained hostility."

As Politico notes, an FEC decision in favor of the Tea Party could "open the floodgates" to a wide variety of groups hoping to likewise engage in financial secrecy.

"While some political nonprofits are able to shield their donors, federal law requires that PACs, political parties and candidates make public the names, employers and addresses of their donors," it adds.

Via Politico.
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Should Tea Partiers receive the same FEC secrecy privileges currently granted to the Socialist Workers Party?

Yes, absolutely

Yes, absolutely

No, definitely not
No, definitely not

No, but nor should the SWP have them
No, but nor should the SWP ha...

I'm not sure, I'd have to think it over
I'm not sure, I'd have to thi...

View Results | 107 Votes

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71 Comments
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  • #24 •
    miketost
    !
    They are the new and growing voice of the republican party.That is what scares both the liberal democrats along with the RINOS.
    4 Reply
  • #28 •
    TheKangaroo
    !
    That's BS. It's hard to get an IRS tax exempt status whatever your political views. Believe me, I know from experience: our Unitarian-Universalist fellowship (that's a liberal Christian tradition that's so liberal it's now more freethinker than Christian per se) came into a couple of million Georges when a member died that she wanted us to use as an endowment for peace and justice causes. A lawyer in the congregation set up the trust, next step was the IRS. They made us jump through more hoops than Michael Jordan's basketball. Now, that was during the Reagan administration, but still. The fact is there's a lot of phony nonprofits out there and I'm not just talking about Pat Robertson and other slick evangelists. Since Obama came in, there's been a lot of pro-social change hucksters out there grifting African-American executives. Now, the fact is the Tea Party is a direct descendant of the militia movement with a lot of nuts in charge of this or that and these folks have defrauded many in the past. Some claim the income tax is unconstitutional and issue their own money, deeds, etc. The IRS is just doing its job, which is to protect those too dumb to investigate these hucksters before giving them your $$$. Get a freakin' clue.
    3 Reply
  • #39 •
    harold_lloyd
    !
    @mtkopf
    Perhaps 'scandal' is the wrong word, but it was surely a case of govt employees just pretending to do their jobs, and there were several of them, including supervisors.

    In a totally non-partisan way, they should be given a good talking to about actually earning their pay.
    And then someone responsible should be keeping an eye on them.
    2 Reply

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  • #5 •
    DerivePI
    !
    The real question is "Should our government be able to shield any special interest who lobbies for public action and money?" If you are lobbying with money, I want to know who you are. If you don't want me to know, then don't lobby with money.
    5 Reply
  • #8 •
    MarkJM
    !
    @kirbstomp1 Which is why I say let the Tea Partiers have their donor secrecy or remove donor secrecy altogether, for ALL groups.
    1 Reply
  • #9 •
    hankf68
    !
    @kirbstomp1 ...your right in that neither should have this "privilege" or any of these organizations...
    2 Reply
  • #10 •
    Realthinker
    !
    The Tea Party donors should be every bit as anonymous as the socialist groups, but they won't be because this regime retaliates against their enemies. The Obama regime hopes to suppress donation to their opposition with the threat of tax audits and other punishment for exercising one's political freedoms. It's the Chicago and totalitarian way.
    3 Reply
  • #38 •
    FFS-
    !
    NO, i the tea party registeres as a political party, they wil get the same level of anonymity.

    Why all the donor secrecy anyhow? All parties and Packs should have to reveal their donors.
    0 Reply
  • #43 •
    Realthinker
    !
    @FFS- It's a political action committee. If you want everyone's donations to be an open book, talk to your representatives about changing the law. I'm all in favor of exposing which ceo's and billionaires donate to the Democrat party. LOL It would bring a screeching halt to some of the discussions around here.
    0 Reply
  • #44 •
    FFS-
    !
    @Realthinker Im all in favor of knowing where ALL PACs and Parties get their money! WIthout special interest donations, conservatives wouldnt know what to stand for!
    0 Reply
  • #45 •
    FFS-
    !
    @Realthinker Democrats have repeatedly pushed to change the law to reveal ALL donors. Conservatives block it every time, and for obvious reasons!
    0 Reply
  • #46 •
    Realthinker
    !
    @FFS- That is nonsense. Prove it. The Democrats specialize is accepting illegal donations from overseas. When caught, they snicker and say they will simply give the money back. There is never any proof that they did. We are supposed to take their word for it after they knowingly accepted an illegal donation in the first place.
    0 Reply

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  • #21 •
    PoliticalSpice
    !
    They should also suffer the same harassment. The swp (who I actually strobgly dislike for political reasons) has been subjected to hundreds of burgularies by the FBI, they FBI has had members fired from jobs, harassed them, put spies in there meetings, send poisen pen letters from some telling lies about others to stir up arguments and disputes. Why hasn't the FBI done this to the tea party yet? Let them do this to the tea party for twenty years like they did to socialist workers party, communist party, black panther party, martin luther king, american indian party, students for a democratic soceity, cispes, etc.), then after decades of harassment, like the left under went, give them the privacy protection they seek. Equal treatment.

    By the way socialist party of america has nothing to do with socialist workers party. Indeed the two groups have a very different idea of what socialism means and how to accomplish it...
    0 Reply
  • #15 •
    fraps
    !
    Donations to a political party a form of free speech. Political speech has traditionally been anonymous speech throughout most of our history. It should return to that status. Many if not most of the independence oriented literature written prior to the American Revolution was anonymous. Individuals had the ability to print or say anything they choose with out much fear of direct reprisal. Government punishes in some way those they it disagrees with.
    3 Reply
  • #67 •
    Wafflecone
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    @fraps it's not a matter of opinion, it's a matter of fact, the tea party is not registered as a political party.
    0 Reply
  • #18 •
    Hillofbeans
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    Nothing about public elections should be private: public office is not private owned business. Rather than grant secrecy for TP remove it for SWP.
    2 Reply
  • #65 •
    marine1
    !
    It would seem that anything having to do with the politics of this country and those supporting such actions, should be readily available for the public. Why should a secular group have a right to influence the direction of a country without the people of that country being aware of the direction we are headed and WHO is promoting these ideals. We already have a government that sticks it to us every chance they get, WHY add more to the list? If you believe in something, you should not want to hide your involvement.
    1 Reply
  • #14 •
    Ryuo
    !
    Ideally, there would be no secrets in politics, so no secret donors, but the problem is the rampant fraud. Why leave an honest farmer from Nebraska open for retaliation from the government when an illegal donation from the Chinese government goes undetected?
    1 Reply
  • #71 •
    sylehrman
    !
    HUAC saw to it that the SWP, SLP, CPUSA, and a number of other left wing political organizations were harassed nearly to extinction over some thirty years, or so. The donor information, in that situation, could expose people who were good Americans and supporters of legal organizations to harassment and so was properly kept secret. Teabaggers, on the other hand, have not been harassed by the government. They simply asked for a status to which they seemed to not be entitled by the IRS who quite rightly investigated their claim. Had they simply told the truth they would not have been further investigated. As far as I know, the SWP and the others never claimed to be anything but a socialist political party.
    0 Reply
  • #61 •
    GedankPol
    !
    All donors should receive the same exact privileges. Why should some be allowed special privileges? And mind you, I know the STING of not being given secrecy privileges. Contributing to a rival against Bill Clinton in Arkansas 1991 governor's campaign cost me my job with Arkansas State Government after the Arkansas Democrat published a list of contributors.
    0 Reply
  • #58 •
    Paultron
    !
    socialism sucks.... i love his little sign there. please inform him that a lot of CEO's garner millions and often billions from tax subsidies so they can drive their fancy cars. Your country is more socialist than ever, it's just anti-socialist for anyone who makes less than 6 figure salary. so i guess all of you social haters are getting what you want anyway so who cares. just relax a bit more while that broomstick goes further in your ass already.
    0 Reply
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