Originally Posted by Russ Carroll
Here is an article reenforcing this sentiment. The GOP is becoming a zombie organization in states all across the country.
https://www.politico.com/news/2023/08/02/broke-state-gop-parties-across-the-country-00109387
"Michigan’s Republican party is broke. Minnesota’s was, until recently, down to $53.81 in the bank. And in Colorado, the GOP is facing eviction from its office this month because it can’t make rent.
Around the nation, state Republican party apparatuses — once bastions of competency that helped produce statehouse takeovers — have become shells of their former machines amid infighting and a lack of organization.
Current and former officials at the heart of the matter blame twin forces for it: The rise of insurgent pro-Donald Trump activists capturing party leadership posts, combined with the ever-rising influence of super PACs.
“It shouldn’t surprise anybody that real people with real money — the big donors who have historically funded the party apparatus — don’t want to invest in these clowns who have taken over and subsumed the Republican Party,” said Jeff Timmer, the former executive director of the once-vaunted Michigan GOP and a senior adviser to the anti-Trump Lincoln Project.
Among some state GOP officials, the mood is grim. One Michigan Republican operative, who was granted anonymity because he wasn’t authorized by the state party to comment, said of that state party: “They’re just in as bad a place as a political party can be. They’re broke…Their chair can’t even admit she lost a race. It’s defunct.”
The demise of the GOP state parties could have a profound impact on the 2024 election. Operatives fear that hollowed out outfits in key battlegrounds could leave the party vulnerable, especially as Democrats are focusing more on state legislative races. Traditionally, state parties perform the basic blocking and tackling of politics, from get out the vote programs to building data in municipal elections.
But not all Republicans are concerned. In fact, some argue that modern politics in the age of super PAC make state parties relics of the past.
“In this modern Super PAC era, the state parties just don’t really matter,” said a national Republican operative who works on Senate races, granted anonymity to speak about internal political dynamics. “There’s a lot of hand-wringing and bullshit about the parties being weak…. At the end of the day, the Michigan GOP being a train wreck is not going to have any real impact on whether or not we win Michigan.”
Still, even that operative noted that weak state parties could have damaging effects in lower-profile state races. And others see potentially sweeping consequences up and down the ballot next year.
Democrats, for one, say they see an opening and are now doubling efforts to win back state legislatures.
“It means Republicans have enormous missed opportunities for early organizing and investing in a strong ground game,” said Jessica Post, a spokesperson for the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, whose efforts to defend and make inroads in statehouses saw its best in a presidential midterm since Franklin D. Roosevelt’s era, creating three Democratic trifectas and losing no Democratic majorities.
Some embattled state parties have recently gotten help from national Republicans. In June, the Minnesota State Party was buoyed by a $160,000 transfer from Protect the House 2024, a fundraising committee backed by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. That sum helped raise its federal cash on hand to nearly $200,000, up from the $54 dollars the month before. Other state parties critical to the fight for the House — including Pennsylvania, California and New York — also got six-figure checks from the McCarthy controlled fundraising operation in June."
If the GOP doesn't change their behavior and priorities, they should change their name. It's too bad
Insane Clown Posse is already taken.
