Friday, July 30, 2010

Michigan fields two Tea Parties, one of them apparently a sleeper designed to protect endangered Democrat candidates

The mysterious Tea Party seeking a place on Michigan’s November general election ballot has submitted the names of 23 candidates for offices ranging from Secretary of State to Oakland County Commission.

According to a filing sent to the state Bureau of Elections late Monday, the group nominated the candidates at a convention held in Saginaw on Saturday. It was signed by Mark Steffek, a retired autoworker and UAW steward who is the not-very-public face of the Tea Party political party.

Steffek, who has made himself available to the media only briefly since the organizing effort got underway three months ago, could not be reached this morning. He has been accused by Michigan’s tea party activists of hijacking the movement’s name in an effort to siphon votes away from conservative Republicans.

It appears that none of the Tea Party candidates is well known. But some of the nominations are in districts, like the 1st and 7th congressional, where seats held by Democrats are imperiled by the tea party insurgency.

The party chose not to nominate candidates at the top of its ticket, for governor and lieutenant governor.

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