NASHVILLE, Feb. 5 (UPI) -- An organizer of the Tea Party Nation convention in Tennessee announced Friday he is forming a political action committee to back conservative candidates.
Mark Skoda, who heads a Tea Party group in Memphis and is serving as spokesman for the convention, said he would be president of the PAC, The New York Times reported. He promised the group would raise $10 million this year and cited Sen. Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., as a likely target of the movement.
The convention opened Thursday night with a speech from former Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., aimed at President Obama and immigrants, CNN said.
"People who could not even spell the word 'vote' or say it in English put a committed socialist ideologue in the White House. His name is Barack Hussein Obama," Tancredo told a cheering crowed.
Skoda's reaction to the speech showed the fractures in the movement.
"It doesn't further the dialogue," he said.
At his news conference, Skoda promised to support candidates based on "first principles," limited government, states' rights, lower taxes, fiscal prudence and national security.
"If they embrace those ideas not as a litmus test but as a sense of where we are as a movement, we will help them," Skoda said.
