The Tea Party Didn't Get What It Wanted, but It Did Unleash the Politics of Anger
Last edited Sun Sep 1, 2019, 11:16 AM - Edit history (1)
In the late summer of 2009, as the recession-ravaged economy bled half a million jobs a month, the country seemed to lose its mind.
Lawmakers accustomed to scheduling town hall meetings where no one would show up suddenly faced shouting crowds of hundreds, some of whom brought a holstered pistol or a rifle slung over the shoulder. One demonstrator at a rally in Maryland hanged a member of Congress in effigy. A popular bumper sticker at the time captured the contempt for the federal bailout of certain homeowners. “Honk if I’m Paying Your Mortgage,” it said.
Organizers convened mass gatherings across the country called “tea parties,” and they had a specific set of demands: Stop President Barack Obama’s health care law; tame the national deficit; and don’t let the government decide which parts of the economy are worth rescuing.
Ten years since that summer of rage, the ideas that animated the Tea Party movement have been largely abandoned by Republicans under President Trump. Trillion-dollar deficits are back and on track to keep growing. The Affordable Care Act has never been repealed, and Republicans concede it may never be. When Congress approved $320 billion in new spending this month as part of its latest budget deal, most Republicans in the Senate voted yes, prompting a lament from Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, who was first elected in 2010 as a slash-and-burn fiscal conservative.
“The Tea Party is no more,” he said.
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Any jackass can kick down a barn. It takes a carpenter to build one - Harry Truman.
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Mick Mulvaney in the Oval Office in May. In 2010, he defeated John Spratt, a Democrat, in South Carolina’s Fifth District. This year, he became the acting chief of staff to President Trump. Doug Mills/The New York Times
In early September 2009, Mr. Mulvaney, then a state senator and part-owner of a chain of Mexican restaurants, sat in the back of a town hall in Rock Hill, S.C., a gathering that was typical for that summer. Seven hundred people filled the hall while another 200 listened on portable speakers outside. Constituents grilled the House Budget Committee chairman, John Spratt, a Democrat, and complained about how much the Obama health care plan would add to the nation’s trillion-dollar-plus deficit.
At one point, a man erupted over another false rumor making the rounds about coverage for undocumented immigrants. “Do not tell me that illegal alien invaders do not get health care free in America,” he said. “I see it every day.”
Mr. Mulvaney decided to challenge Mr. Spratt, and on the day he announced his campaign, in November 2009, he accused his opponent of selling out. “People can say a lot about me,” Mr. Mulvaney said at the time. “One thing they can never say is that I’ve sold out my principles.”
Since then, Mr. Mulvaney has risen to become the director of the Office of Management and Budget and acting chief of staff to President Trump. In the three years that Mr. Trump has been in office, the nation’s deficit has increased each year. Last week the Congressional Budget Office said it would rise again every year for the next four. By 2029, the national debt is set to reach its highest level as a share of the economy since after World War II.