SAN ANTONIO – A prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance are usually how tea party gatherings begin, said George Rodriguez, the South Texas coordinator of the Tea Party Patriots.
But at a protest on the sidewalk outside KWEX-TV, Rodriguez said it was a way to show they're not terrorists.
He said he and his membership disagree with a Spanish-language spot only airing on local Channel 41 that says armed militia groups on the border are terrorists aligned with the tea party.
Rodriguez said he doesn't blame Bexar County Democrats as a whole for buying the commercial time.
"It's one of their leaders that has chosen the opportunity to smear us," Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez was referring to Manuel Medina, chair of the Bexar County Democratic Party, who said, "They have a right to be upset but the truth of the matter is they don't own the truth."
At a rally outside party headquarters on Interstate 10, Medina referred to the images in the commercial of militia members in military garb, weapons in hand.
"If they dress like terrorists, if they act like terrorists, it they talk like terrorists, they're terrorists," Medina said.
Rodriguez said South Texas has 20 tea party groups with 50,000 members who only want "constitutionally-given opportunities."
"That is not terrorism. I don't understand it," Rodriguez said.
But Rodriguez said he does acknowledge some militia members also are involved in the tea party, like Brandon Burkhart.
"We are a quick-response group, like a militia without the name and more law-abiding," Burkhart said.
He said his group was invited by a rancher in the Brownsville area to patrol his property.
Burkhart said despite background checks, some bad apples turn up, as they do in law enforcement agencies.
"They slip through the cracks," he said. "But for the most part, they're law-abiding citizens and they should be treated as such, not called terrorists."
However, Medina said, the tea party should "come out that they're against what the militia is doing on the border."