A look at the Republican Party’s state party problem

State Republican parties in roughly half the major battleground states are awash in varying degrees of dysfunction, debt and disarray.

In Arizona, the chairman of the state’s Republican Party recently resigned after a leaked videotape surfaced of him appearing to offer bribes to convince a candidate to drop out of the Senate race.

In Georgia, the state party’s coffers have shrunk by more than 75 percent as it has spent more than $1.3 million in legal fees since 2023, much of it defending fake voters facing criminal charges, including the party’s former chairman. And in Nevada, the party chairman himself is facing charges for his role as a fake voter in the 2020 election.

As former President Donald J. Trump has tightened his grip on the Republican presidential nominee, the widespread problems have led to growing concern among top Republican officials. There is no single explanation for the divergent party struggles in the swing states that are most important for the presidency. But across the map, state parties have become battle zones for the broader struggle within the Republican Party between the party’s old guard and the rising Trump wing, with rifts that could be divisive and costly.

The situation is especially acute in Michigan, where a vicious power struggle remains unresolved. Pete Hoekstra, the new party chairman officially recognized by the Republican National Committee, remains locked out of state party servers and emails by the person clinging to power, Kristina Karamo. That fight comes as questions arise about where all the money in the state has gone.

A top lawyer for House Republicans wrote an unusually sour letter to Michigan’s state party last month, accusing party officials of “inexplicably” squandering the $263,000 they received from the House Republicans’ campaign arm of ‘exorbitant’ and unnecessary expenditure. almost nothing to help Republicans keep the House.

“We are becoming increasingly alarmed,” the general counsel for the campaign arm, the National Republican Congressional Committee, wrote in the letter.

Strategists who have worked on previous presidential campaigns say state parties matter and, if effective, they can serve as one of the most important invisible and unsung forces in national politics. They provide the national party with an efficient way to inject cash into key states and coordinate field operations during the election, while campaigns can leverage cheaper postal rates and unparalleled local knowledge.

Mike DuHaime, a veteran of multiple presidential campaigns and former RNC political director, said the work of state parties is critical.

“It’s a lot of blocking and tackling that certainly doesn’t come up in a debate or it wouldn’t get as much attention as a TV commercial,” he said. “It really can be the difference between a point or two. In a state that is decided by 1 or 2 percent, this can make a difference.”

Not all state problems are about ideology. In Florida, an ongoing battleground that looks less competitive in 2024, the state GOP ousted its chairman last month after police confirmed he was under criminal investigation for sexual assault.

Within the Trump operation there is frustration about the sad state of affairs in important state parties. But Chris LaCivita, who Trump would like to appoint as the RNC’s chief operating officer once he becomes the party’s presumptive nominee, said the woes were worrisome but not unsolvable.

“The challenges facing a handful of state parties have not become so great that they would be unable to fulfill their electoral responsibilities,” Mr. LaCivita said, adding that the campaign was enthusiastic for the new leaders in Michigan and Arizona, both of whom he described it as ‘solid’.

From here on out, Republicans won’t be able to rely on the RNC to make up the difference financially.

The national party started February with $8.7 million in the bank. Party officials have discussed tapping a line of credit to continue operations until the nomination battle ends and more money comes in. Some of the Trump team’s frustration is directed at the RNC for allowing state parties to flounder without adequate oversight and training.

And beyond financial troubles, the national party has seen other potential turmoil as Trump has made his choice to replace Ronna McDaniel as chair — though Ms. McDaniel technically hasn’t stepped aside yet. Mr. Trump’s pick, Michael Whatley, is the chairman of the North Carolina Republican Party, and his elevation could create yet another swing-state opening for a state GOP

The RNC recently told members that it would hold a training meeting on March 7 in Houston that some see as a likely meeting to replace Ms. McDaniel if she resigns, as expected, after the South Carolina primary on Saturday.

The January letter to the Michigan party from House Republicans was first reported by Detroit News, is a sign of how state parties can be an important cog in the broader political apparatus. National congressional leaders had raised money and transferred some of it to the state party, hoping it would be spent on key House races there rather than on “fancy conferences.” The party entered February with less than $75,000 after taking debt into account.

“These do not appear to be the actions of a state party committed to conservative principles; or frankly, anyone who has the desire or ability to elect Republicans,” House Republican Counsel Erin Clark wrote in the letter.

Some Republicans acknowledged the state party’s woes but downplayed its significance.

“We’ve had dysfunctional state parties and won everything, and we’ve had really competent people and lost everything,” said Daniel Scarpinato, chief of staff to Doug Ducey, the former Arizona governor who clashed with his administration’s leadership. state party. “I really don’t think it matters that much,” he said, other than the lower shipping costs.

Democratic state parties are not all well-oiled machines, but some Democrats see the problems for Republicans at the state level as an opportunity. President Biden has been raising money in concert with the national party and in every state, and Mr. Trump is expected to eventually do the same.

“State parties are really important partners, especially in House races,” said Rep. Suzan DelBene of Washington, chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. “Disruptions absolutely matter.”

For Arizona Republicans, simmering distrust and divisions came to light in January. Kari Lake, the leading Republican candidate for Senate, released a recording made last year in which then-party chairman Jeff DeWit appeared to ask her to name a price to keep her from running for Senate in 2024.

The surreptitious recording sent shivers through the entire state party. Mr. DeWit soon resigned and was replaced by Gina Swoboda, who worked on Mr. Trump’s 2020 campaign and has since been part of the fruitless hunt for voter fraud. The Republican Party of Arizona has seen that its fundraising efforts are not at the level where the party was four years ago; taking into account outstanding debts, the party has about half of the total cash available this year that it did in January 2020according to the most recent campaign finance reports.

In Georgia, former Speaker David Shafer was among those charged for their role in the vast effort to overturn the 2020 election in Georgia, including organizing an unofficial slate of electors after the 2020 race. he left, Mr. Shafer wrote in an exit note that the state party had supported the slate of electors and “voted to ratify their actions and pay their legal fees.” The result: Some of the biggest spending for the party in recent months has gone to lawyers representing Mr. Shafer and other alternative 2020 fake voters who have been indicted, totaling about $1.3 million.

The party entered 2023 with $1.7 million, but entered February with less than $400,000.

“It’s clear that we need to spend resources on this that we would otherwise spend on political action,” said Josh McKoon, the current chairman of the Georgia Republican Party. But he defended the spending as necessary to protect people from what he described as overzealous persecution, arguing that the party was “the only thing standing between these people and financial oblivion.”

Governor Brian Kemp, Republican of Georgia, has long been at odds with the state party. In 2021, he signed a law that allowed him to create his own political committee that can accept unlimited donations. Some Republicans thought there might be a thaw in the rift when Kemp’s name — and that of the state House speaker — appeared atop an invitation to a fundraising gala last week.

But it turned out that the governor and the speaker did not attend, despite the fact that their names were on the invitation.

Georgia is not the only state where perpetuating Trump’s falsehoods about the 2020 election has proven costly.

In Nevada, Michael McDonald, the longest-serving chairman in state party history, is facing a grand jury indictment for his role as a fake voter, though that has not shaken his hold on the state party. also charged). Mr. McDonald was instrumental in significantly transforming the state’s influential early battle, tilting the rules in Mr. Trump’s favor by effectively blocking the super PAC that targeted the former president’s rival, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, would have helped, by keeping delegates tied to the caucus system as opposed to the more open primaries.

Mr. McDonald and Nevada Republican Party officials did not respond to requests for comment.

Party officials elsewhere worry that weakened or distracted state parties — unable to mount a joint state operation and field campaign — could make a difference in elections decided by razor-thin margins.

“What do we do?” asked Oscar Brock, a Republican national committeeman from Tennessee. “It will be difficult if you have disorganized or messy situations in state parties.”