NH-01: Freshman Orientation Gone Wild?

by: Dean Barker

Sun Nov 14, 2010 at 19:45:20 PM EST
Right after the election, Frank Guinta told the Concord Monitor that he'd be joining a newly formed Tea Party Caucus in Congress.

Then Beth LaMontagne Hall reported that Guinta would be heading "to Washington on Nov. 14 for orientation."

Hmm... turns out that's when the Tea Party Patriots orientation for frosh members is. Which brings us to the fiasco (h/t TPM):

Tea Party Patriots, one of the largest coalitions of tea party advocates, released to supporters the personal cell phone numbers and e-mail addresses of freshman Republican Members who the group thinks are in danger of being "co-opted" by D.C. insiders.

In an e-mail to supporters that was also posted Thursday on IronMill.com, Tea Party Patriots leader Jenny Beth Martin accused the Claremont Institute, a conservative think tank, of trying to lure the freshman lawmakers away from the tea party movement by hosting orientation programs that conflict with those scheduled by the tea party group.

A look at the letter (I'm not linking to it) urges the Tea Partiers to call Frank Guinta and Charlie Bass directly.  The Bass connection is especially ironic, since, after telling the Tea Partiers their agenda was "exactly the same as mine," post-election he doesn't want to have anything to do with the TP caucus.

Our first district Congressman-Elect was lucky on the timing here.  Imagine if the Tea People had been ordered to contact Guinta after learning he opposes cutting a form of government welfare.
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