Republican Senate candidate Ken Buck worked to shore up Tea Party support Monday in the wake of news he called “birthers” in the tea party movement “dumbasses” for hectoring him on the issue of President Obama’s citizenship and right to hold office, a topic Buck has repeatedly dismissed as a distraction.
Buck called up leaders of the tea party movement who disseminated his mea culpa.
“Ken Buck called me just moments ago and asked for help getting out a message,” Travis Whipple, Chairman of the Longmont 9/12 tea party posted on the group’s website.
“Ken Buck was recently caught on tape by a Democrat who follows his campaign and records the events, telling an individual that the [Colorful adjective here] Tea Parties should stop with the Birth Certificate. The context behind what happened and what was said, according to Mr. Buck, was that this was the result of an individual who would not let Ken Buck speak about our growing national debt and the unconstitutionality of the amount of spending in Washington.
This remark came as the results of frustration, anger, and exhaustion, and he admitted the comment was wrong, and should not have been made, especially against the Tea Party. The media and his opponents will try and use this to drive a wedge between Mr. Buck and the Tea Party movement. It is of course up to each of you to decide how this will effect you, but in the brief conversation I had with him, I found his apology sincere.”
Buck’s controversial comments were picked up widely after they were reported by the Denver Post, which based its story on the audio tape. But the Post’s report lacks context.
The comment came after a member of the meet-and-greet crowd that came to see Buck at a June event in Crowley heckled the candidate repeatedly on the issue of Obama’s citizenship. Attendees said the woman heckler was “astonishingly rude.” I was outside the event later that Buck let loose to the Democratic Party operative who was taping the conversation.
“Will you tell those dumbasses at the Tea Party to stop asking questions about birth certificates while I’m on camera,” he said.
The Whipple post with the Buck explanation seemed to resonate at least initially across the tea party blogosphere. Meantime Buck reiterated that he respected the movement at other tea party friendly outlets, including the Colorado Springs Constitutionalist Today, which reported him to say he has “always supported the tea party and [he] always will.”
Months ago Buck told the Colorado Independent that he viewed the tea party movement humbly. He said the “tea party chose [him], not the other way round.”
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