Tea Party Express Fraud Exposed

Last month I wrote a blog about the Tea Party Express bus tour and what a complete load of bullshit it was. I pointed out that the tour was being run by a political action committee (PAC) pretending to be the Tea Party movement and the PAC was using the grassroots and exploiting our emotional attachment to the tea party name to raise money for their PAC. They sent out fundraising emails several times a week begging people for money to help “save our country” and to “help elect conservatives”.
I said at the time that people had no idea where their money was being spent. I also pointed out that the PAC was paying real leaders in the movement to be on the bus and make it seem more legit. Serveral people on the bus tour took issue with my blog post and said that I was wrong about the tea party leaders being paid (we will see about that in just a minute!). It all just seemed so disingenuous to me. They knew that people were writing checks thinking that the money was going to the Tea Party movement when it was, in fact, going to the PAC. I consider what they did theft through deception.
I caught a lot of hell from the AstroTurf thieves that did not like the fact that someone was telling the truth about their little scam. Well, I should have titled this blog post “Vindication” because we now have proof that I was right. The PAC that organized the bus tour published their financial records recently. Every PAC is required by law to disclose their expenses. We now know how much of your money was spent to “get conservatives elected” and how much went into the pockets of the people on the bus.
While they were here in Orlando they went out to dinner at a restaurant called “Black Olive” and they spent more than $4,000. This is for one meal!!! Another night here in Orlando the gang ate at the Citrus Club, one of the most expensive restaurants in downtown Orlando, but don’t worry they only spent $2,000 of YOUR money that night. Tens of thousands of dollars went straight into the pockets of the people on the bus, even the person who sanctimoniously told me that she wasn’t getting paid to be on the bus! Tens of thousands more of your dollars went to a consulting firm owned by one of the people on the bus.
It really makes me want to puke that these people sent out emails exploiting our attachment to the Tea Party movement and our patriotism so they could raise money and live like rock stars for a month. In total the PAC raised a million dollars from hard working patriotic people like you who thought that their money was going to be spent to save our country. Instead they spent $800,000 of that million dollars on their lavish bus tour and multi-thousand dollar dinners at the finest restaurants in America. All is not totally lost though, they did give conservative Doug Hoffman, from NY-23, $1,000! Or 1/6 of what they spent on TWO meals here in Orlando.
You can view the expenses here:
http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/dcdev/forms/C00454074/441321/sb/ALL

To make matters even worse the PAC has already sent out emails asking people to donate up to $5,000 so they can begin another tea party bus tour. It absolutly shocks the conscious that with unemployment at 10%, people’s homes being forclosed on, and our government spending trillions of dollars it doesn’t have, these people are asking hardworking patriotic people to piss away their money so Thealeadership of this PAC and their AstroTurf friends can travel around America spending thousands of dollars on dinners and “consulting fees” for the people on the bus.
It is my hope that this blog and the link I provided saves people from throwing their money away again. If you want to make a real difference find a candidate you believe in and donate to their campaign. Or better yet, use the money to run for office yourself. Please don’t give it to these lying thieves so they can live it up while they travel the country on someone else’s money. Doesn’t that sound more like something a liberal would do? How can these people claim to have our values of fiscal responsibility when they are spending $4,000 on ONE dinner? If you have not already please look over their expenses at the link above and see for yourself what the Tea Party Express spent your money on to “save our country”.