Rand Paul Quotes

I mean, people who say that the Tea Party isn't a grassroots movement, I think, are incorrect. I think in some respects, it is a grassroots movement.

The Tea Party is an organic, spontaneous movement that rose up in opposition to to the Pelosi-Reid-Obama agenda.

The Tea Party movement started in late 2008 as a rejection of President George W. Bush's bailout of the auto industry and Obama's excessive stimulus spending. It evolved into a movement opposed to ObamaCare, and grassroots efforts were employed to find qualified political candidates who could beat incumbents.

The American movement, Tea Party, whatever you want to call it, I think that is a very hopeful moment for the country and, I know, we really are the community organizers, are we not?

The Tea Party is simply a loose description of local activism driven by Americans who want smaller government and more self-reliance. That sounds like what the Founding Fathers had in mind, does it not?

Sometimes people credit me for the Tea Party. It's actually the other way around.

Well you know I'm very supportive of what the Tea Party is trying to do. They're very concerned with spending, the deficit, the bailouts, you know all of those kinds of things. But I really think that the strength of the Tea Party is being a grassroots movement.

I think that, you know, when we start talking about the Tea Party, people want to marginalize that into some kind of organization or party, but it really isn't.

The Latest Tea Party Piñata

People ask me if I'm the father of the Tea Party movement... I was the spark... that started it.

So, a lot of my supporters back home are members of the Tea Party.

Voters are hungry for principled, conservative fighters - because the threat to our liberties from Washington never has been greater.

I think the Tea Party has brought important issues to the table.

I do think the Tea Party position will prevail, and I am often asked: 'What has the Tea Party done and is it even still alive?' People think because there have been no demonstrations with the 'Don't Tread on Me' flag it's gone, but it hasn't.

There are good people and bad people in all organizations fundamentally however, when you look at the basis of the Tea Party it has nothing to do with race. It has to do with an economic recovery. It has to do with limiting the role of our government in our lives. It has to do with free markets.

I think the Tea Party movement is great. I think anybody who has been frustrated over the last few years with the Republicans and Democrats, when they were trying to grow government and have spending and we weren't focusing on creating jobs and get our private sector growing again, I think that's when people started to wake up.

Today, grass-roots Republicans want to drink a bottle of 2010 small-government wine, but our candidates were bottled in another era, before the tea party's ideas took root.

I think people are confused about what the Tea Party is. I mean, they were a broad cross-section of Americans who came together concerned about our debt and our spending. And they're interested in constitutional, limited government. And so they're not one group of people. They're thousands of small groups all over the country.

The Tea Party doesn't like politicians.

The Tea Party emerged from a laudably grassroots base: libertarians, fervent Constitutionalists, and ordinary people alarmed at the suppression of liberties, whether by George W. Bush or Barack Obama.

If being the lightning rod that started the Tea Party is what's written on my tombstone, I'll be very happy.

I certainly would not deny that the Tea Party, the issues that they have looked at are certainly important to me as well... debt and deficit and recognition of the Constitution.

I think that the tea party, grassroots ideology will win every time.

I spoke at the University of Georgia, and a whole contingent of Tea Party people in Hell's Angels regalia came in and sat in the front and scowled at me while I gave my talk. And afterwards the head of the group got to the microphone and said, I'm surprised that I agree with almost everything you said, but I'm worried that you're a big government guy.

Well, look, I'm as Tea Party as it gets.