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Ronna Romney McDaniel: Keep or Fire?
The head of the GOP national committee is Ronna Romney McDaniel. She is in the beginning of her third term and has overseen a lot of disappointing elections (2018, 2020, 2022, 2023). She is the face of the “Red Mirage” and not the “Red Tsunami,” which GOP voters have been expecting. She has managed to buck the trend of the party out of power doing well in elections. She is the head of the Loser Party. She was named in last night’s debate and Vivek Ramaswamy explicitly called her up on stage to resign. Should the GOP keep her or fire her?
I happened to catch an interview with her on today’s Ruthless podcast. She says that 2023 losses were not her fault. The national GOP cannot spend in state contests or ballot initiatives (she implied there are laws). She says that every loss was because the candidate refused to discuss abortion (against her advice) and they let the Dems and other groups lie and say that the GOP candidate would implement a handmaid’s tale type of hell. It is the Dems only issue and ignoring the lies was decisive, according to McDaniel. She also said the national GOP focuses on voter turnout and not issue ads.
In my opinion, the GOP exists to help candidates. The GOP needs to recruit, train, and help candidates with messaging, lawfare, and research. The national GOP should do national GOTV, platform messaging, and coordinate the state GOP offices. They need to advertise like Coke does. Whatever the GOP is doing, is not working well enough and something needs to be changed. Many people on Twitter are calling for her to be fired. What are your thoughts?
Published in General
She should be fired. I am sure she is a nice person; however, as noted 4 failures in a row. In addition to that she was not really able to capitalize on Biden’s poor performance in 2022. It may be just bad luck; however, if a GM or Football head coach had her record they would be on the unemployment line. I think the same should go for RNC chair.
Stick with me for a bit. When the Corvette was redesigned as a mid-engine potential supercar I read about the design team and the final product. The articles said that the Corvette group bought a used Ferrari 458(?) and took it apart to study it in detail. It was the benchmark for the new Corvette model. I’ve never driven the mid-engine model and probably never will, but reviews called it an Italian supercar at half the price. Their approach evidently worked. I guess they were in it to win.
What does this have to do with Ronna? I’ve read many articles describing how the Demo-rats have beaten the repubs. Several different reasons have been tagged as #1, but the list of reasons seems to differ mainly in the ranking. If the RNC knows what the Dems are doing to defeat them, why isn’t it doing what the Corvette design team did? Go down the list of Demo-rat tactics, understand why each worked, and either copy them or try to neutralize them? Easier said than done I suppose, but I can’t see any other option. Unless, of course, the plan is to be the perpetual minority party and fund raise by talking about the danger the other branch of the Uniparty presents.
I notice that my spam folder is filling up with requests for contributions. In fact, one says that Ronna nominated me for the “Lifetime Achievement Award” as a loyal GOPe supporter. Odd since with the exception 2000 I hadn’t voted for a repub for president since 1988. Until 2020, that is.
They don’t want to win
Well, let’s put it this way: what is your perception of the national GOP brand? Nevermind what she is or is not doing, when the Republican Party brand isn’t popular with its own voters, change should be the default until there’s new blood and new energy.
As to addressing a certain issue, interesting points raised here:
https://twitter.com/stclairashley/status/1722435495983022143?s=20
The stark reality is this: laws do not change the culture, laws reflect the culture. You want to end it, you have to be persuasive morally and culturally. I know people here are going to comment this shouldn’t be necessary, that it’s obvious. You are fighting against a culture that ranks the value of an individual by what groups they identify with, as opposed to his/her singular achievements. In fact, this opposition culture devalues achievement altogether.
The good news is a majority has always accepted there should be restrictions, but D’s control the narrative and engage in their usual fearmongering. McDaniel is correct that GOP candidates cannot allow D’s to do this.
Let’s assume that she is right that she was telling candidates what to do and they were ignoring her. That is on her. She isn’t effective (except at losing) and thus is hurting the GOP at a national level.
This guy agrees with her. He discusses the well known state level contest in Virginia between a GOP candidate (Owen) and the porn streaming Democrat (Gibson).
Allegedly Owen states that the “Republican establishment” would not let him discuss abortion, although it’s not clear who exactly the “establishment” was.
I have no idea if McDaniel is the problem, or a problem, but I think she should be replaced.
She needs to go. She’s living in a world that no longer exists. It’s also a reasonable rule that at some point the chief executive takes the hit for a record of continued failure. It should have happened before, it needs to happen now.
What the GOP should do?
Fire her .
What it will do?
Keep her. Of course.
Yeah, I’m certainly not defending her. Okay, she thinks they should X, Y, and Z. How did she communicate that? Were there position papers and briefing materials sent to state committees? County committees? This was largely a ballot initiative and local (mayoral, etc.) election, did the National Committee communicate at all with at least the mayoral candidates? I don’t know, but the further you go down the ballot, the more inexperienced the candidate. Perhaps a video series? It could be nuts and bolts, not issue driven.
I suspect they left it to the state committees, who probably left it to the county committees. Right now the organized party is…not in full agreement with the people interested in voting for its candidates. I suspect in too many places, two things were done to support local candidates: jack and the other thing.
Not called the stupid party for nothing.
I’ve been a solid Trump supporter since he knock Cruz out in 2016 and I receive all those entreaties from the national campaign but I don’t see the visible effort for Trump and I am not really privy to what goes on in various state campaigns. The excuse listed for her not supported state campaign causes financially sounds bogus.
So she states she’s not responsible for 2023 due to these rules but 2022? 2021? 2019?
Ironic that on RedState yesterday, she had a column about support for Israel. That’s all fine and good but that was the first thing I’d heard from her since her re-election.
She can’t get involved in state platforms but she can pontificate on Israel & Hamas?
Not buying it. Get rid of her.
Possible replacements? I thought Harmeet Dillon was an improvement. Election law experience is a must. Ken Cuccinelli? Some one more based for sure.
The GOP is definately in a similar “Doom Loop” that we point out that Democrat run cities are. The more alienated the base is, the less small dollar contributions they get and the more reliant they are on Big Donors. I’d entertain the idea of being a dues paying member but then I see how/where they spend money.
I recognize that money is a real problem but I don’t trust the existing party mechanisms. I have given to candidates but realize that there are countless unknown state & local Conservatives that could use “seed money”. If any of you have a trusted PAC that supports Conservative primary challenges and solid state & local candidates – please let me know. The Tea Party movement has turned into a grift that I don’t trust any longer.
Mitt Romney is widely viewed as part of the GOPe that is fighting the MAGA wing of the party. Having a Romney in the top party position is a bad look if there is to be cooperation and reconciliation. Who should replace her? Not Jenna Bush (assuming she even wanted to have anything to do with it and I don’t know where she stands on anything- but you understand what I mean) There needs to be someone that can bridge the gap.
Part of the reason the GOP is hurting for small dollar donors is that elected GOP doesn’t do anything about the corruption in our government. The IRS went after the tea party and the GOPe stood aside and watched. Lois Lerner didn’t even lose her pension. The DOJ came down like a ton of bricks on J6 folks. They have raided the houses of Prolife activists. They have not protected Supreme Court Justices. They are going hammer and tongs after Trump. It sends the message that supporting Republicans is a dangerous game to engage in. I got the message loud and clear. If the GOP wants money from me they have to show me two things:
Until then my wallet is closed. Besides with the Biden economy I need all the cash I can get to put fuel in my car and food on the table.
I realize that Vivek Ramaswamy is percieved to be a stalking horse for Trump (I think he is), but I’d like to see what he could do in that role. Young people seem to really respond to him (I like a lot of what he says) but would like to see him placed in a role where he can’t just state what he’d do or “what should be’ – he’d have to shape, cajole & horse trade donors, state & local parties and candidates. Let’s see how he does.
Three terms, three strikes, she’s out. Given the stakes, she should have been out after 2020. Find someone who wants to win and knows how to make that happen.
Without reading other comments, I say fire her. I have been saying that since 2020 or earlier. It has always been odd to me that she continues to receive Trump’s support. I hold her in contempt for allowing the DNC to attack state voter laws in 2020 without legal opposition from the RNC. She may claim 2023 was not her fault, but what about 2020 and 2022? There is nothing wrong or embarrassing about being against killing babies. Republican candidates should be loud and proud on that issue. But they also should, if they are running for a national office, be consistent with the Supreme Court ruling. It is a state-by-state issue.
She should have been fired long ago. It doesn’t matter if the problems aren’t her fault. This is about winning and losing.
Owen won with 51.4 percent of the vote. He didn’t have to talk about abortion. Of course Gibson was all abortion all the time. Look at her…hobby. That had to have resonated with enough voters, especially in Goochland County which went for 66.3 percent for Owen.
I heard an interview with the Moms-4-Liberty founder and she says that they have helped 365 people win school board seats. They now have a “kit” on their website for people wanting to run for office. They recognized that motivated people are generally inexperienced in running for office and the kit is there to help them. That organization is just 3 years old and it sounds like they are more helpful than the 170 year old Republican Party.
She’s Trump’s choice. He leaned on the delegates in the national party election to re-elect her. He’s happy with her; no one else is.
I’d like to hear his explanation.
Every single text and email from every single person running for every single office…people whose names I have never heard and those who are famous…and every single issue-oriented text asking for my approval and support, and then, of course, money…every single time…ends up at WinRed, the GOP money vacuum. “We want your opinion on the National Debt. Please take this survey!” You take the survey and press ENTER. Bam, pay WinRed. It’s really disgusting.
Charlie Kirk and Trumpsters are calling for Trump to push her out. Maybe he will. It would be awkward for the guy who refuses to attend GOP debates to call for the GOP presidents ouster, but it could not be more awkward than Vivek calling for her to resign at the opening of the debate. The picture below shows Vivek and Ronna in heated discussion after the debate. Allegedly, Ronna told someone during the debate, “well he is not getting any money.”
Agreed but elected GOP are perfectly comfortable being the minority party.
Me too, Django.
He probably never was. She needs that money for her four-day spa weekends and for new clothes.
Ronna McDaniel’s RNC spent MILLIONS on private jets, limousines, booze, luxury retreats
Maybe because Democrats like John Kerry don’t need anyone to pay for their private jets?
A Romney should be the head of the Republican party the way a Californian should be Speaker of the House. . .