South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley announced in February the co-chairs of her statewide grassroots re-election steering committee. Included on the steering committee is, Roan Garcia-Quintana a Tea Party activist who serves at the same on the board of the largest white nationalist organization in the country, the Council of Conservative Citizens—the lineal descendant of the Jim Crow-era white Citizens Councils.

A Virginia Tea Party activist, Doug Story, who was also active in white nationalist circles pleaded guilty to weapons charges. An investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigations, the Secret Service and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, also revealed a trail of racism and alleged threats against President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder.

On August 17, Douglas Howard Story, 48, of Manassas, Virginia, pleaded guilty to illegally possessing a machine gun in violation of the National Firearms Act. According to court documents, Story came to the attention of law enforcement through a confidential source who saw posts from Story on an Aryan Nations website. These posts indicated that Story was preparing to buy an AK-47 and have it modified to become fully automatic. According to an affidavit, "The conversations and posts were reported to the case agent and show the propensity for hatred and violence toward African Americans, Jewish Americans, other minorities and a number of political figures."

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords had been a target long before an assassination attempt that left six dead and fourteen wounded. In 2010, her congressional office in Tucson was vandalized soon after an Alabama militiameister called for Democratic Party windows to broken, as Mother Jones journalist James Ridgeway recalled. A gun was dropped at a Douglas, Arizona town hall meeting on health care reform Giffords held in August 2009. Sarah Palin targeted her district with a gun sight cross hairs (err, landscaping symbol) during the last election cycle. (Robert DePugh's 1960s-era Minutemen used to send their opponents a set of crosshairs in the mail, with an ominous 'We Are Watching You" business card.) Asked who his daughter's enemies were, Giffords' father identified "the whole Tea Party."

Tea Party group now called the Patriot Action Network

Peter Gemma, a resident of a Sarasota, Florida, is a Tea Partier signed up to the ResistNet Tea Party faction. Gemma is also a professional white nationalist. He served as head of Design, Marketing, and Advertising for the white nationalist Council of Conservative Citizens newsletter, the Citizens Informer.

Mauldin, South Carolina resident Roan Garcia-Quintana is involved in several local Tea Party groups and is registered as member on the ResistNet Tea Party faction website. [1] The Cuba-born activist who runs a group called the Americans Have Had Enough Coalition served as “advisor and media spokesman” for the 2010 Tax Day Tea Party rally in Greenville, South Carolina. [2]

In addition to his Tea Party activities, Garcia-Quintana recently joined the National Board of Directors of the Council of Conservative Citizens (CofCC), the largest white nationalist group in the country.

A quick-view guide to the relationships between the various national Tea Party factions.