Prince William Tea Partiers rally in Richmond

RICHMOND, Va. - As far as attendance goes, Richmond’s two-day convention of Tea Party Patriots takes the lead, with a total turn-out of 2,700 – the biggest draw for any Tea Party convention in history, according to the chief organizer of the event.

“Even in Nashville, where they had Sarah Palin, they only had 600 people,” said Jamie Radtke, president of the Richmond Tea Party and chairwoman of the Federation of Virginia Tea Party Patriots, who spent weeks organizing the Oct. 9-10 convention.

“This is the largest Tea Party convention ever, at least four times bigger than any other,” Radtke continued. “It’s been an amazing success and the feedback of the people is they’ve been telling me it’s the best they’ve ever been to.”

Nancy Schiffman, a Prince William resident who serves as secretary for the Federation Virginia Tea Party Patriots and as a leader in the county’s Tea Party chapter, said the high turnout represented a growing public awareness of the movement – what it was, as well as what it wasn’t – and of a general acceptance of its principles.

“We’re not trying to be a political party. We’re trying to be about the issues,” she said. “We think of it as trying to build bridges, and I think we’re succeeding in Prince William County in at least understanding one another.”

The Tea Party in Prince William formed in 2009, Schiffman said, and since, has grown a handful of names on an email list to more than 2,000.

John Taylor, president of the Gainesville-based Tertium Quids, a nonprofit, issue advocacy group that pushes for free-market solutions, also characterized the convention as a “superb success,” one that was “extremely well organized and planned. However, he added, the convention would probably not hold much sway with November’s elections, at least in Virginia.

“It’s not going to have a huge impact in November because some of the Republican challengers we’ve had selected by the Republican establishment are, quite frankly, not very good candidates,” Taylor said, explaining that the Tea Party will soon have to choose which direction it wants to take in regard to supporting its candidates. “Will the Tea Party hold candidates’ feet to the fire [and root out Republicans-In-Name-Only], or will they just rubber stamp Republican candidates [just to win seats]? I think it will be a state-by-state thing, when they finally decide that.”

The Tea Party convention included speeches by some of  the biggest names in politics: Former Clinton White House strategist, Bill Morris; Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell and Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli; former CNN host Lou Dobbs; and former Sen. George Allen.

Staff writer Cheryl Chumley can be reached at 703-530-3903.