The movement bashed health-care reform and taxes on the steps of the State Capitol Thursday. But critics say it's misinformed.
By Bill McCarthy
bmccarthy@wyomingnews.com
Moses Lee, organizer for the Tax Day Tea Party rally, address a large group of at a rally held at the Wyoming State Capitol on Thursday. Andy Carpenean/Boomerang photographer
CHEYENNE -- Trustin Hasenauer announced at the Tax Day Tea Party protest here Thursday that he is a candidate for U.S. president.
He won't be on the ballot for some time, though.
You have to be at least 35 to run, and he is 6. But as soon as he is 18, he said, "I'm going to register and vote them out," drawing a roar from the about 300 people who attended.
Trustin's dad, M. Lee Hasenauer, organized the protest in front of the State Capitol on the day federal taxes were due.
Hasenauer said he called his son to the podium that "no politician has ever stood on" because the rally is supposed to be fun and educational for old and young alike.
To that end, the podium held copies of the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence and the Bible.
Julie Cantrell also brought her four children, ages 2 to 13, to the rally. Two held signs that when combined said: "A dollar is a dollar, no matter how small."
She said she is concerned about the new health-care reform law, the deficit and inflating prices on necessities such as food.
Cantrell said she is teaching her children that there are consequences to actions, and her family will suffer the consequences of government spending too much money.
Like tea party protests across the nation, people with conservative values voiced concerns about health-care reform, the national deficit and what they say is a growing tax burden.
But Bill Luckett, executive director of the Wyoming Democratic Party, said the protesters are educating their children and followers with fiction.
"These people were nowhere to be found when George W. Bush and the Republican Congress turned a balanced budget into a record deficit so they could give tax cuts to the rich," Luckett said.
When the Democrats won the presidency and Congress, "these people started rallying, supposedly to complain that they are, 'Taxed enough already,' although (President Barack) Obama and the Democratic Congress gave tax cuts to 98 percent of working families."
Luckett cites a study by Citizens for Tax Justice and separate analysis by William Gale, head of the Tax Policy Center at the Brookings Institution.
He said Republican partisans are putting out bad information.
"It is very frustrating to see so many people misinformed" about taxes, Luckett said.
Tea party protesters said their movement is nonpartisan, however.
"If this were a Republican event, I wouldn't be here," said Frank Smith of Cheyenne.
He held a sign calling for nullification of health-care reform and calling on the Wyoming Legislature to hold a special session to join states suing the federal government over the new law.
Gov. Dave Freudenthal, a Democrat, has said joining the lawsuit would be an expensive gamble, and Wyoming will be bound by the result without having to pony up.
Several speakers urged the crowd to call the governor's office to try to change his mind.
Smith said he is an independent and there were many other independents and Libertarians in the crowd.
Local radio conservative talk-show host Dave Chaffin said tea party attendees are unfairly painted as a bunch of right-wingers and out-of-touch Republicans who only want to "bash Democrats."
"They're not," Chaffin said. "They're Americans."
Luckett sees partisanship, though.
"Like so many of their other claims, the facts dispel the notion that they're nonpartisan. They are, in fact, primarily right-wing Republican activists," he said.
He cites a New York Times/CBS poll released Thursday saying that of the 18 percent of Americans who say they are tea party supporters, 54 percent are registered Republicans, and only 5 percent are registered Democrats.
Maureen Hurley sees the underlying problem stirring the protests as erosion of respect for traditional and patriotic values that are no longer being taught to American children.
An important case in point, she said, is that local schools from elementary to colleges do not teach history on Veterans Day.
"Veterans Day is a recognized holiday in the state of Wyoming," she said. School districts show it as only a "planning day," she said, with kids getting half of a day off.