From Sean Cockerham in Anchorage --

The Tea Party Express, the group backing Joe Miller's campaign for the the U.S. Senate, was kicked out of the National Tea Party Federation this weekend after its spokesman wrote an offensive blog post about what he called "Colored People."

This comes as the California-based Tea Party Express plans a press conference in Anchorage tomorrow to talk about its new ads supporting Miller's Republican primary race against Sen. Lisa Murkowski. The Tea Party Express last week started what it said were $100,000 worth of radio ads supporting Miller, and promised to spend as much as a million dollars on the race.

A representative of the National Tea Party Federation, a group that seeks to represent the various Tea Party Groups, went on "Face the Nation" today to announce that the Tea Party Express was being expelled.

Conservative commentator Mark Williams, until last month chairman of the Tea Party Express and currently listed as spokesman for the group, wrote the blog post in response to an NAACP resolution saying Tea Party leaders needed to crack down on what it said were racist elements in the movement.

Williams' response was posting a fictional letter from what he called "Colored People" to President Abraham Lincoln. It began "Dear Mr. Lincoln."

"We Coloreds have taken a vote and decided that we don't cotton to that whole emancipation thing. Freedom means having to work for real, think for ourselves, and take consequences along with the rewards," the letter said. "That is just far too much to ask of us Colored People and we demand that it stop!"

Williams has taken down the blog post.

The Tea Party Express has said that electing Joe Miller over Lisa Murkowski is its top priority nationwide going into the Aug. 24 primary. Miller has welcomed the group's support, but stressed it is independent of his campaign.

The Tea Party Express has been an effective force in Republican primary races in the Lower 48 and has held bus rallies to generate support for the movement, some featuring Sarah Palin, Anne Coulter and other well known figures.

Update -- The Joe Miller campaign just put out a statement. Here's its entirety:

Joe disavows racism of any kind. He agrees with Dr. Martin Luther King's admonition not to judge anyone by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. Mark Williams stepped down as a chairman of the Tea Party Express last month, in the wake criticism caused by earlier controversial remarks that he had made. His satire, "Letter to Lincoln," appeared on his private blog, not anything directly linked with the Tea Party Express. We trust that organization in no way shares those views.