The Tea Party’s love-hate relationship with Mitt Romney

By Rick Lax

Thursday, June 9, 2011 | 5:31 p.m.

Local Tea Partiers don’t like Mitt Romney. Last week, the Nevada-based political action committee Western Representation launched a “Stop Romney” campaign. They started up a Facebook group, snatched up the domain StopRomney.org, and are poised to run TV and radio ads.

Expensive, but feasible. During the 2010 election cycle, Western Representation raised $410,000. Of course, to stop Romney from winning the Nevada primary, the PAC might have to raise a lot more. Last time Romney visited Vegas he collected $10 million in a day.

What’s Western Representation’s beef with Romney? For starters, they don’t like the health care plan he put into place in Massachusetts. They see it as very similar to Obama’s plan. They also don’t like that Romney has changed his positions on issues such as gay rights and abortion.

“The 2012 election is going to be about leadership,” Western Representation Executive Director Bryan Shroyer told me. “The Republican nominee is going to have to make the case that Barack Obama's presidency has failed to provide the leadership this country needs to face its current challenges. Romney doesn't have a leg to stand on when discussing leadership, in large part due to his waffling on issues. Changing your beliefs to match the electorate is the opposite of leading.”

No clue on what candidate they will be endorsing in 2012, though. “All the candidates have a lot of work to do to convince voters that they deserve our support,” Shroyer replied. “As of right now, the only candidate we know for sure we won’t endorse is Mitt Romney.”

The big question is, what will Shroyer, Western Representation and statewide Tea Partiers do if Romney wins the Republication nomination? Do they dislike him enough to run their own candidate against him in the general election, even though doing so would only help Obama? Nevada Tea Partiers could gain ballot access by starting up a new party with the Secretary of State or by revamping Scott Ashjian’s (fake) “Tea Party of Nevada,” which is currently listed as a “qualified minor political party without ballot access,” pursuant to NRS 293.171. Or they could mount a write-in campaign.

But something tells me they won’t. As much as local Tea Partiers dislike Romney, I’m pretty sure they’d take him over Obama any day of the week. Just don’t ask them to admit that before the 2012 Republican National Convention.