Independence Party

Former Sen. Dean Barkley told tea partiers in an email Tuesday that they should join the Independence Party and rename it the Tea Party. Already, tea party–affiliated candidates are aligning themselves with Gov. Jesse Ventura’s former party, including 5th Congressional District GOPer Barb Davis White and Steve Wilson in the 1st Congressional District.

Col. Joe Repya, a former Republican Party activist who left the GOP to run for governor under the Independence Party banner, has decided to drop out of the race, citing the party’s failure to “stand by its own rules and principles.” Repya announced his decision on his website Sunday evening:

Retired U.S. Army Lt. Colonel Joe Repya announced on Wednesday that he will run for governor as a member of the Independence Party. Repya left the Republican Party of Minnesota in 2009 citing lack of transparency and financial mismanagement.

One obstacle keeping Bob Anderson from running against Rep. Michele Bachmann next year was a pending vote by the Independence Party over cross-endorsements. Last election, the party endorsed the DFL’s Elwyn Tinklenberg, but Anderson ran anyway, getting 10 percent of the vote in a race won by Bachmann by a 3-percent margin. After the IP voted to drop cross-endorsements Saturday, Anderson is “encouraged,” but still undecided about running.

Could “Mr. Independent” — as Lou Dobbs promotes himself — become “Mr. Independence Party”? A Politico piece this morning ponders news that the illegal-immigration foe, Birther and former CNN anchor is considering a run for president in 2012. What’s not clear is what banner he might run under. Minnesota’s Dean Barkley, quoted by Politico, hopes [...]

Gov. Tim Pawlenty’s announced plans to axe state refunds for political contributions of $50 or less has set off an email stampede as candidates urge donors to give before the program dies July 1.

Last used as a metaphor for Norm Coleman’s dwindling odds at winning back his old U.S. Senate seat, Monty Python’s Black Knight is again being conjured as a political metaphor — this time by the Independence Party, which likens itself to the tenacious fighter who, despite getting all his limbs lopped off by King Arthur, [...]

UPDATED Well, they do call it the Independence Party. It turns out the party’s candidate in the 3rd Congressional District race, David Dillon, has donated a considerable sum of his own money to his campaign through Sept. 2: $122,000. That’s 81 percent of his campaign’s $150,513 war chest, which according to a fresh report from the Center for Responsive Politics’ opensecrets.org, makes Dillon the eighth biggest self-funding candidate for the U.S. House or Senate this year, by percentage of total money raised.

They say that numbers don’t lie. If so, then there are three numbers that tell a dismal tale for the Independence Party: 37, 16 and six. That’s the share of the vote Independence Party gubernatorial candidates won in 1998, 2002 and 2006. The numbers tell the tale of a party that has waned significantly in [...]

Rallying around 2006 gubernatorial candidate Peter Hutchinson’s exhortation that “the campaign’s not over,” the Independence party’s central committee worked Sunday to chart their course for the next two years.

Hutchinson’s speech, delivered after extensive discussion on possible restructuring of the party, emphasized that despite his only polling 6% in November, his ideas were getting across.

“Senator Tom [...]