No one is surprised the Tea Party Patriots Citizens Fund is holding Sen. Lamar Alexander’s feet to the fire on the raging border security battle. But the group’s use of foreign punctuation has left some in Washington wondering ¿que paso?  

In the email attack, the group repeatedly frames the Tennessee Republican’s name in inverted exclamation points — punctuation typically associated with the Spanish language.  

Some fellow hacks considered this rhetorical jab to be nothing short of racist. Tea party leaders attempted to brush aside any such aspersions.  

“It’s a play on Alexander’s use of campaign signs with exclamation marks,” the group told HOH via email. “The Spanish exclamation mark signifies Sen. Alexander’s vote for amnesty and support for an open-borders or no-borders immigration policy.”

This isn’t the first time the anti-establishment activists have been associated with racial tension. Tea Party Patriots co-founder Jenny Beth Martin clashed with the conservative-leaning Wall Street Journal earlier this year over an editorial assailing the “anti-immigration orthodoxy on the right.”