WASHINGTON– Who is the face of the Tea Party? If you go by the numbers, you might say it’s a middle-aged white man. A recent New York Times/CBS poll reported that almost 90 percent of self-identified Tea Party supporters were white and more than 70 percent of them were over the age of 45. But the movement also has supporters from other demographics who are shaping its future.
Brandon Cooper is one of the party’s less stereotypical members. He is the chairman of the Howard University College Republicans and also interns for the Republican National Committee. The suburban Cincinnati native also comes from an all-Democrat family, but says his political ideology emerged from an early age.
“My earliest political memory would be during the 2000 elections,” he says. “My parents, my mother and grandmother, they’re both Democrats. I remember sitting at the dinner table and sometimes we’d discuss politics, and for some reason I just gravitated towards the policies of President Bush, or at that time Candidate Bush. Ever since then I’ve been a true and faithful Republican.”
Cooper also finds himself in the political minority at Howard, a school that he describes as having a liberal-leaning campus. For the most part, Cooper says that there is a civil exchange of ideas between him and his less conservative peers, but sometimes tension arises.
“Some of the professors will let their liberal ideology float through their lesson plan,” he says. “And I’m always the one to raise my hand and say, ‘That’s not exactly correct,’ or ‘That’s not exactly how I see it.’”
In contrast, Cooper found himself surrounded by many more people who shared his political views when he attended the April 15 Tea Party rally at the National Mall.
“The Tea Party is about a movement, and it has ideas and values that I agree with,” he says. “So, it was natural for me to go down to the Mall and participate in active protest against the policies of this administration.”
Cooper says he also attended the rally to build contacts with other conservatives around the country to raise awareness of the Howard College Republicans. Based on his cordial interactions with other Tea Party supporters, he rejects allegations that the movement is tinged with racism or dominated by an agenda that only appeals to white members.
“The movement’s not about race, it’s not about class, it’s not even about political party. There were a lot of Democrats and liberals there,” he says. “It’s about a movement and ideas, so as long as you link to those ideas you’re accepted into the Tea Party.”
Despite the Tea Party’s recent rise in popularity, its future is not clear-cut. Neither is the movement’s exact role in Cooper’s future political organizing. But he says it will influence his work with the College Republicans.
“Whether or not the Tea Party in name comes on Howard, I don’t know if that’s a possibility,” he says. “But definitely the ideas of the movement already exist here in the College Republicans. Limited government and lower taxes– in the future, I think we’ll see a lot of those movement ideas on campus also.”
Cooper also envisions the College Republicans having a more visible presence on campus in the future. In particular, he’d like to increase the size of the organization, which has already grown from a handful of members to a solid roster of 15 within the past couple years.
And perhaps the Tea Party’s most meaningful impact on Cooper is showing that grassroots political organizing, like what he does with the College Republicans at Howard, really does make a difference.
“This is pretty much the first time that a conservative grassroots effort has made a change in politics,” he says. “I think, looking forward, the Tea Party movement is going to have a great impact on the elections this fall.”