Congressional Tea Party Caucus met Today (Wednesday)

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A group of two dozen House Republicans, led by Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.), officially launched the congressional Tea Party Caucus on Wednesday, strongly defending the grass-roots conservative movement as a positive force in American politics and repeatedly insisting it does not have racist motives.

Many congressional Republicans have long associated themselves with the "tea party" activists who emerged during last year's stimulus and health-care debates and sharply oppose President Obama's agenda, but Bachmann's move to create this caucus formalizes their relationship with the GOP.

Bachmann and her allies say the caucus will invite activists to Capitol Hill, solicit their ideas and perhaps turn them into policies.

The members did not specify what impact the new caucus might have. Most Republican members of Congress already oppose most legislation that the tea party dislikes, reducing the need for a caucus to push the GOP to the right. And House Republicans already have a group of its more conservative members called the Republican Study Committee.

The Tea Party Caucus's creation creates a choice for some Republicans who want to capture the energy of the tea party but not defend its more controversial elements. Rep. Mike Pence (Ind.), the No. 3 leader in the House GOP, has joined the group, but another conservative, Rep. Eric Cantor (Va.), the No. 2 leader, opted against doing so. Cantor said he did not join in part because the "beauty" of the tea party movement is that it's "organic and it's certainly not of Washington."

"We decided to form a Tea Party Caucus for one very important reason, to listen to the concerns of the tea party," said Bachmann. "What we are not, we are not the mouthpiece of the tea party, we are not taking the tea party and controlling it from Washington, D.C. I am not the head of the tea party, nor are any of these members of Congress. The people are head of the tea party."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/21/AR2010072103517.html?hpid=topnews