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08/29/2012 07:52 PM

Republican Celebrities Make Presence Felt At Convention

By: Zack Fink

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The Republican party may not attract as many celebrities as the Democrats but there are a handful of well-known and less well-known actors and TV personalities who are here for the Republicans. NY1's Zack Fink filed the following report.

There's a little star power in Tampa.

Actor Tim Daley is there with fellow actors Rachel Harrison, Evan Handler and Carol Kane to push continued funding for the arts, something Republicans have been hostile to in the past.

"I'm still not willing to paint all Republicans with one brush or all Democrats or anyone," Daley said.

Or Chuck Woolery, the game show host who is in Tampa to promote Generation America, an organization he calls the antithesis to the left-leaning AARP.

"I'm probably more like the Tea Party," Woolery said. "A grass roots, Constitutional, balance the budget, cut the spending, let's get back to normalcy and try to grow this country out of this mess because it's the only way out of it."

The common thread in Tampa seems to be that if you are a celebrity promoting a cause or even someone promoting a product or a brand, this is a good place to do it because of the high concentration of journalists, opinion leaders and, of course, elected leaders.

"We certainly have a huge number of possibly voting senators, governors, potential presidents, vice presidents, all kinds of people that we can reach in a three-day period," Kane said.

For some, it's just a show of support for the party they stand with, even if that makes them stand out in the entertainment industry.

"Oh, I know I am in the minority," said actor Stephen Baldwin. "But there's a bunch of conservatives in Hollywood."

One of those conservatives is Jon Voight, who was critical of the media.

"If you read any of the other papers on the left, and almost all of the main media is, you'll see ways to denigrate the speeches last night," he said.

So while Hollywood tends to be bastion of liberal opinion, the smattering of conservatives who may sometimes feel marginalized have finally found an audience in Tampa.