Michele Bachmann on State of the Union: Tea party response OK with GOP?
| Washington
Republicans are rushing to defend Rep. Michele Bachmann (R) of Minnesota, who plans to deliver a response to President Obama鈥檚 State of the Union address Tuesday night on behalf of the tea party movement.
The official Republican rebuttal will come from Rep. Paul Ryan (R) of Wisconsin, chairman of the House Budget Committee.
Some television networks plan to show at least some of Congresswoman Bachmann鈥檚 response, after Congressman Ryan鈥檚, creating the appearance of a divided Republican Party with dueling messages.
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But that would be a false impression, Republicans insist.
"I think you get a variety of opinions and all Republicans aren't the same, but I don't see it as trying to usurp somebody else's prerogative," said Sen. Rand Paul (R) of Kentucky, a tea party favorite, in a CNN interview Tuesday. He foresees 鈥渙ne main Republican message, but other voices as well."
Tim Pawlenty, the Republican former governor of Minnesota, called Bachmann鈥檚 planned speech 鈥渃ool鈥� in a CNN interview Monday. 鈥淚t鈥檚 all good,鈥� said Mr. Pawlenty, who is probably running for president and has every reason to play nice with the tea party and Bachmann, a fellow Minnesotan who has suggested she also might run.
Still, Republican House majority leader Eric Cantor seemed less than amused Monday by the Bachmann factor. He told reporters that he looks forward to 鈥渁ll comments,鈥� but that Ryan is giving the official GOP response. When reminded that the reactions of other House members to Obama鈥檚 speech won鈥檛 be carried live on a network TV pool feed, he posed a rhetorical question: 鈥淢aybe I should ask why is that the case?鈥�
In other words, maybe by showing Bachmann鈥檚 response, network news is trying to whip up a sense of division within the Republican Party?
Or maybe they鈥檙e just showing viewers something that might actually be interesting. After the Republicans鈥� stunning victory in last fall鈥檚 midterms, the big question has been how the conservative tea party movement and the establishment GOP would mesh. Certainly, parsing any differences between the rebuttal delivered by Ryan 鈥� no slouch as a conservative 鈥� and that of Bachmann, who founded a Tea Party Caucus last year in Congress, will be part of any post-SOTU analysis.
A cofounder of the California-based Tea Party Express, which endorses candidates and organizes bus tours to rally activists, says the group meant no disrespect to Ryan when it organized the Bachmann response.
鈥淭he Republicans couldn鈥檛 pick a better person to make their response,鈥� Sal Russo, a Tea Party Express founder, wrote in an e-mail to Slate鈥檚 David Weigel. 鈥淏ut we thought the Tea Party should have their own, and Bachmann is a perfect match for that. We are going to do our response after Ryan so we don鈥檛 step on his remarks. I am sure they will be hitting similar themes because Ryan has views that are closely aligned with the Tea Party."
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