The battle over who will be chair of the Republican National Committee is starting to heat up. At first, it looked as though Ronna McDaniel, the current RNC chair, would hold on to the job.
Then Republican lawyer Harmeet Dhillon threw her hat into the ring. Lee Zeldin, who grassroots Republican activists favored, decided not to run but doesn’t think McDaniel should serve another term.
Now some other groups are starting to step away from McDaniel.
The Texas Tribune reports:
After disappointing midterms, Texas GOP votes unanimously for a new national leaderFrustrated with the outcome of the midterm elections, the executive committee of the Texas GOP voted unanimously Saturday to call for new leadership at the national party.By a vote of 62-0, the State Republican Executive Committee passed a resolution saying it had lost confidence in the chair of the Republican National Committee, Ronna McDaniel. The resolution said she “must be replaced” but did not endorse a challenger.“Under Chairwoman McDaniel’s leadership, the GOP lost both houses of Congress and the White House, and seriously underperformed in 2022 by further losing ground in the Senate and only barely winning a majority in the House,” the resolution said, adding that new leadership is necessary to “address deficiencies in fundraising, messaging, GOTV and election integrity.”
A few days ago, the Arizona GOP passed a resolution calling on McDaniel to resign:
The Hill notes that the process of choosing a chair is designed to favor an incumbent:
Still, McDaniel has racked up endorsements for another term from a majority of RNC members, as well as former RNC Chairman Reince Priebus, former White House counselor Kellyanne Conway and Blake Masters, who lost his Senate bid in Arizona last month.The process of choosing an RNC leader is designed to insulate an incumbent from an outside challenge, former party officials said, making it unlikely the organization will move on from McDaniel before 2024. But that hasn’t squashed dissent among some Republicans.
Something at the RNC needs to change. That much is clear. McDaniel should ask herself if she wants to stand at ground zero if there are painful Republican losses in 2024.
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