Discord in the Tea Parties?

I’m hearing — though the players have not yet responded to my questions — that there’s some serious friction between one of the main organizations of the Tea Party movement and one of the late-comers. The main organization is Tea Party Patriots, the genuine grassroots group (with some marginal ties to FreedomWorks et al.) launched in February, after Rick Santelli’s CNBC “rant.” The late-comer is the Tea Party Express, the offshoot of the conservative, GOP-centric Our Country Deserves Better PAC.

The discord begins with Our Country Deserve Better PAC’s co-opting of the Tea Party brand — it got Fox News pseudo-journalist Griff Jenkins to ride along on its cross-country express — to push a personality-driven Republican message. Some long-time Tea Party Patriots are unhappy with Mark Williams, the radio host who serves as vice chairman of OCDBPAC, and who has said inflammatory things about Democrats and President Obama in national TV appearances. Amy Kremer, the national coordinator of Tea Party Patriots, is being nudged out because of her participation in the latest and forthcoming Tea Party Express tours.