If you thought tea partiers were disenfranchised and staying home for the 2012 elections, you thought wrong according to Tea Party Express Co-Chairman Amy Kremer.
Kremer has been traveling all over Iowa ahead of tonight's caucuses, talking to voters about the issues they are concerned about while reaching out to every campain along the way.
“I don’t think that any of these candidates can win the nominiation without the support of the tea party movement,” Kremer told Townhall.
Like general voters, tea partiers have been frustrated with the current GOP field, but that doesn't mean they aren't engaged or planning to eventually back a candidate.
“The movement is definitely split up here on who they are supporting,” Kremer said, adding that there is a large portion of voters who still don’t know who they will vote for.
Despite voter frustration, people are involved and motivated to get Barack Obama out of office in 2012.
"I know that the people here [Iowa], the movement here, I’ve been meeting with tea party movement here, people are motivated and engaged," Kremer said, adding that Washington spending is still out of control and that ObamaCare still hasn't been repealed. “The media wants to write this narrative that tea party is going away because we haven’t backed a candidate but that is simply not true.”
Although the main focus over the past month has been what happens in Iowa, Kremer predicts we won't see much influence until the South Carolina primary in a few weeks, saying the race is still very fluid and that she doesn't expect any big surprise in New Hampshire.
“What happens in Iowa won’t tell the story,” she said. "It's going to be interesting to see what happens here tonight."
And the Tea Party movement isn't stopping at GOP primaries, they're ready for the general election too with a plan to keep ObamaCare front and center as a major election issue.
“This is the first time every the tea party movement will play in presidential politics," she said. “We want to repeal ObamaCare and the only way that ObamaCare will get repealed is if he isn’t re-elected."