RINOs in Cuyahoga County

Ralph King and President Trump

Ohio’s Ralph King: Establishment Republicans
are Trying to Take over Local GOP
to Help Matt Dolan in Primary

The “Ralph King” in the Breitbart headline is Cleveland Tea Party founder Ralph King :

Ralph King, the co-founder of Cleveland Tea Party Patriots, told Breitbart News Saturday that establishment Republicans with close ties to Democrats are trying to infiltrate the Republican Party of Cuyahoga County in order to help U.S. Senate candidate Matt Dolan early in the primary process and wrest control away from conservatives who have taken command in recent years.

King, who has been active in Cuyahoga County Republican politics since 2001, explained that the establishment Republicans are trying to infiltrate the local county party in an effort to help Dolan in the upcoming 2024 Senate race’s Republican primary after his failed attempt in 2022 when he came in third behind now-Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) in the GOP primary.

“The activists and the conservatives, you know, we’ve been fighting for a long time,” King acknowledged. “We just stopped a lobbyist from taking over the Ohio Republican Party. There’s a huge fight between the lobbyists and the conservatives in the Ohio House over the Ohio speaker. And in Cuyahoga County, which I’ve been on for many, many years, you know, we continually fought against the liberals, the establishment, the donor class, and until recently, we finally got a good chair to put a stop to all that. And the liberals and the RINOs in the establishment, you know, they are pushing back. And at this moment, what they’re trying to do is they’re trying to hold illegal meetings … to try to get rid of a new chairman that we have [who] has given voice to the members and has stopped putting their finger on the scale, to tip it towards the establishment, and they’re mad they no longer control the party.”

“Between [former] President [Donald] Trump coming out [in support] for J.D. Vance and us on the Cuyahoga County Republican Party, Matt Dolan tried to steal that endorsement,” King continued. “Cuyahoga County Republican Party is one of the largest GOP parties in the state of Ohio. Although we’re in the pit of the Democrat heart of Ohio, we do have the largest party. It is Matt Dolan’s home party. That’s the importance, so between President Trump and the Cuyahoga County Republican Party slapping Matt Dolan down in that last election — between the two — we ultimately killed his chances to win the primaries. That’s why Matt knows he needs control of the GOP in Cuyahoga County at this point. So what he did, he’s vowed revenge since that time.”

King ultimately said that the “illegal meeting” the establishment Republicans are trying to hold for the Cuyahoga County Republican Party is to remove the current chair, Lisa Stickan, halfway through her four-year term to put Lee Weingart in as chair to help Dolan be better placed in the 2024 Republican primary.

“So what [Dolan’s] done is we have a gentleman by the name of Lee Weingart,” King explained. “Lee Weingart is a lobbyist. Lee Weingart has a history of donating to [Rep.] Marcy Kaptur [(D-OH)], [Sen.] Sherrod Brown [(D-OH)], a long history of donating to [former Rep.] Tim Ryan [(D-OH)] — actually made $3,000 donations to Tim Ryan in 2021 and was actually campaigning for Tim Ryan in Iowa [during his failed presidential run] — which would be par for the course for Matt Dolan to team up with a guy and a lobbyist like Lee Weingart. Lee Weingart tried to hold an illegal meeting. He used Matt Dolan’s firm to give some outrageous legal opinion supporting this illegal meeting. And what people need to realize is there’s a key between Matt Dolan and Lee Weingart and the donations to the Democrats and supporting Democrats. Matt Dolan was originally a Democrat before he started calling himself a Republican. … We are in a fight for the life of the Cuyahoga County Republican Party against the establishment likes of Lee Weingart and Matt Dolan.” . . .

Ralph King: fighting the good fight.  Full report is here.

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GOPe: Selling Out Your Own Side

 

Does anyone remember that the GOPe spent many years raising millions of dollars on the promise, the absolute promise to repeal Obamacare?  The GOP got the House, the Senate, and the White House, and Obamacare still stands.  It occurred to me then that the GOPe's strategy to raise lots and lots of money was/is to make promises that they do not intend to ever keep.  I figured that the GOPe did not WANT to be in the majority, lest it become obvious that they don’t mean what they say.  They just want your money.

Emerald Robinson’s latest column at The Right Way Substack has a take on this charming state of affairs:

. . . Right now, GOP leadership is working on a mass amnesty bill in the lame duck session that’s opposed by the overwhelming majority of GOP voters. To fully understand the depth of this treachery, you have to recall that GOP politicians spent the last two years complaining about the invasion on the Southern border. They did this every day — every hour! —on Fox News, and other corporate media outlets. It was the GOP’s daily drum beat. Kevin McCarthy even promised to impeach DHS chief Alejandro Mayorkas over the border disaster.

In the midst of all those promises — and all that posturing — GOP Senate leadership is ready to deliver a mass amnesty bill? That’s either political malpractice of the highest order, or the ultimate sign that the GOP establishment stands for nothing and stands against nothing.

It’s the latter, of course. 

Read the rest here.  I would argue is that the collapse didn’t just happen in the past month or so.  It’s been in a state of collapse for years;  Unfortunately, it is only relatively recently that many conservatives have begun to recognize the collapse. 

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The Big Ugly

Defining terms:  Sundance at Conservative Treehouse (CTH) has been calling this battle ‘The Big Ugly‘ for around a decade: The Big Ugly battle is essentially the fight between the grassroots working class base of MAGA voters and the professional political snobs in control of the Republican Club boardroom.

And now, Sundance has nailed it again.  He figured out that the mid-term election Red Wave might still materialize, but it's likely that as of now, conservative voters are already demoralized, because the media and GOPe did -- and still are -- gaslighting the public:

We’ve seen this exact playbook before.

The delayed “official results” from Colorado, Arizona and Nevada are all part of the organized narrative engineering from SoS [Secretary of State] offices, party officials (local and state) and corporate media. 

…

In the big picture, the goal was to undermine and deflate the MAGA base represented by President Donald Trump.  2022 midterm MAGA wins downplayed and or delayed. 2022 MAGA losses overemphasized, highlighted and promoted as part of the script.  That’s what we are seeing now.  That’s all we are seeing now.  

And this blog bought into the Red Ripple reports.  As Mark Twain said, it’s easier to fool people than it is to convince them that they have been fooled.  Count me as un-fooled.  At least yesterday, we blogged on Trump’s success rate with endorsing candidate:  95% of Trump-endorsed candidates won.  So far.  (And I hope the conservative blogosphere re-thinks the decisions to throw Trump under the bus.)

On Thursday, Sundance fleshed out the bigger picture. You may find encouragement not only in his analysis but also in the reader comments.  He starts off:

The Democrats and professional Republican class both want to see the populist movement destroyed for the same reason Mitch McConnell wanted the Tea Party destroyed in 2010.  The assembly of the united middle-class and blue-collar base inside the Republican Party, essentially the broad MAGA movement, represents a Main Street threat to Wall Street control of the GOPe.

There are trillions at stake.

As Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ megadonor and Citadel hedge fund billionaire, Ken Griffin, openly admitted recently the Wall Street goals are (1) stop the populist movement and (2) get the Republican Party back in alignment with the multinational “corporate world.”  These are the same goals of the Republican leadership in Washington DC and the same goals as the corporate media who serve as the public relations firms for Wall Street.

The collaborative group, which includes the entirety of the funding mechanism and management behind Ron DeSantis, viewed the 2022 midterm election as an opportunity to reset the Republican Party away from the populist MAGA influence.  The strategy was to roll out of the August DOJ Mar-a-Lago targeting, directly into a nationally rebranded DeSantis operation and then lead up to the 2022 midterm election.

Anything that can cast Donald Trump as a negative would be enhanced, and anything that would cast the MAGA movement as a positive would be diminished.  In part, this is the intent behind the delayed positive election results from key MAGA races in CO, WA, NV and AZ, combined with emphasis on the negative - albeit controlled - election ballot outcomes from Michigan and Pennsylvania.

At the 30,000-foot level the attacks against President Trump are, quite frankly, attacks against the MAGA populist movement represented by President Trump.

Read the entire posting here.  The posting concludes with President Trump’s Statement re: Ron DeSantis.  I recommend reading Sundance’s posts a couple of times;  there's a lot to absorb. 

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Ohio Special Election on August 3

 

Mark your calendar.  From Ballotpedia:

A special election to fill the seat representing Ohio's 11th Congressional District in the U.S. House will be held in 2021. Primaries are scheduled for August 3, 2021. The general election will be held November 2, 2021. The filing deadline was May 5, 2021.^[4]

The special election was called after Marcia Fudge (D-Ohio) was confirmed as secretary of housing and urban development in President Joe Biden's (D) administration. The Senate voted 66-34 to confirm Fudge on March 10, 2021.^[5]

The primary will occur on August 3, 2021. The general election will occur on November 2, 2021. General election candidates will be added here following the primary.

There are 10 candidates running in the Democrat Party primary.  According to Conservative Angle and OAN:

The special election in Ohio’s 11th district has heated up as Democrats duke it out for who will succeed recently confirmed Housing and Urban Development Secretary Marcia Fudge.

Big names have stepped in to endorse either side of the Democrat campaign. Hilary Clinton has voiced her support for moderate Cuyahoga County Democrat Party Chair Shontel Brown. Where progressives like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) have endorsed former co-chair of the Bernie Sanders 2020 campaign Nina Turner.

The race has become a proxy battle for the future of the Democrat Party, however, whether it will trend progressive or hold its establishment roots in the years to come.

There are two Republican Party candidates running in the primary, Laverne Gore and Felicia Ross.  Cuyahoga County always votes blue, so neither (R) candidate probably stands a chance.  Still, everyone needs to vote.

It’s too bad those of us in the 11^th District cannot vote for Ruth Edmonds in the 15^th district, but if you’re in Columbus, you can.  This household watched a brief interview with her on (sorry) Fox, and she was a refreshing conservative, all for faith, family, and community.

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Mike Gibbons for Ohio

 

Our household just received a campaign letter from Mike Gibbons.  It’s 5 pages long, and here’s the text of the first page:

My name is Mike Gibbons, and last week I launched my campaign for United States Senate.

I wanted to take this opportunity to introduce myself. Frankly, too much of politics these days is 30-second television commercials and canned sound bites. However, this election is far too important.

The first thing you need to know about me is that I'm not a politician. I'm a businessman. (Frankly, I don't even like politicians.)

But I need to warn you: I'm blunt. I tell it like it is. That might get me into trouble now and then, but that's who I am, how I'm going to campaign, and how I'll be if you elect me.

I grew up in Parma, a working-class suburb of Cleveland. My father was a high school teacher and a wrestling coach. My grandfather was president of the laborers' union.

I went to work at an early age. I had a paper route. I worked a bandsaw on the factory floor. I poured concrete.

Sometimes people hear "Cleveland businessman" and make assumptions. Well, you might as well say, "concrete Finisher," because I've done plenty of that as well. I guarantee you that I'll be the only Senator who can finish your driveway.

I started my own company at the age of 37, working alone with a desk and a phone in a small space above a dentist's office.

Today, I've achieved success beyond my wildest imagination. I've achieved my American dream.

I'm running for Senate because I want to help more people achieve their American Dreams.

On the 5^th page, he closes:

More than anything, however, I hope this is the beginning of a conversation between concerned Ohioans.  It’s a job interview, and I hope to earn your support and your vote.

Sincerely,

Mike Gibbons

Letter is paid for by Gibbons For Ohio:  https://www.gibbonsforohio.com/ 

CTP previously blogged on the Ohio Senate race in March and April.  Some liberty groups in Ohio are supporting Josh Mandel; as I wrote in the linked April blog, it would be nice if Ohio did not replace RINO Portman with another establishment GOP – such as Josh Mandel or Jane Timken.  So far, Mr. Gibbons is looking good.

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Uniparty update

Sundance at Conservative Treehouse calls the DC political elite the “Uniparty.” I’ve also come across the term “fusion party.” Robert Curry at American Greatness calls it the “biparty establishment”, and he puts recent political developments into perspective. 

Here’s a sample:

In 2016, the Republican party leadership looked on in disbelief as their voters stuck them with a candidate who had an excellent claim not to be a Republican. Meanwhile, the Democrats had a close call; their voters very nearly stuck them with a candidate who was not and had never been a Democrat. Republican voters rejected “their” party, and Democrat voters came close to rejecting “their” party, and they might have succeeded except for behind the scenes efforts by the party professionals to rig the system.

These were astonishing developments, but we need look no further than Barack Obama for the explanation.

For more than a century before the advent of Obama, the Left had adhered to a stealth strategy. They maintained a remarkable degree of party discipline over that long period, believing stealth was necessary and that it was the secret of their phenomenal success in overthrowing the Constitution incrementally, progressively. Instead of openly rejecting the Constitution, they had carefully installed in their voters a belief in what they called “the living Constitution.” A living Constitution is, of course, no Constitution at all; it is really a dying Constitution, a Constitution in the process of being murdered by a thousand cuts.

. . .

But Obama broke with tradition. To those paying attention on the Left, he did not hide his disdain for the Constitution, for America, or even for the flag—and the Left went wild. For the Left, Obama’s success meant the galling necessity for stealth was over, that they could let it all hang out because America was ready for a leftist revolution.  Many Democrat voters agreed. They were no longer willing to put up with a Democrat candidate mouthing platitudes neither they nor the candidate believed so that candidate could be elected.

Comes the hour, comes the man. [Bernie] Sanders was almost completely untainted by the strategy of stealth. Not only was he not a Democrat, but he had also honeymooned in the Soviet Union. In 2011, he wrote an op-ed in which he declared that the American dream is “more apt to be realized in South America, in places such as Ecuador, Venezuela, and Argentina” than in the United States. At the Democratic candidates’ forum in New Hampshire on Friday night, he said America is “a racist society from top to bottom.”

As for Trump, we can say of him what Lincoln said of Grant: “he fights.” Trump’s voters wanted a fighter, someone who would not be rolled by the biparty establishment.

Mr. Curry’s conclusion:

We now have an openly anti-American party and an openly pro-American party.

Read the rest here.

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Trump, Sanders, and American discontent

art credit: www.writerscafe.org

From Pat Dooley’s FB page:

Trump, Sanders and American discontent

Trump is now the presumptive GOP candidate. He started as a joke candidate. The pundits trashed him from left and right. But, somehow, he resonated with ordinary Americans and gained traction in the polls. National Review, the leading conservative magazine, devoted a complete issue to attacking Trump. He survived that broadside. His GOP competitors spent 10's of millions of dollars on attack ads against him. He spent virtually nothing. He said stupid things, insulted virtually everyone, and still he kept winning. This is actually a unique event in modern American history. No outsider has ever done what Trump has just done.

How did he do it? He chose a great campaign slogan and he hammered illegal immigration, bad trade agreements, job losses, and political correctness. He used his media savvy to garner free airtime his opponents could only dream of and he found ways to dominate virtually every media news cycle. He spent virtually nothing on advertising and his whole campaign was run on a shoestring. Jeb Bush blew through $130 million and got nowhere.

Bernie Sanders is giving Hillary a run for her money, and he is appealing to people on the left who are disillusioned with "politics as usual." He doesn't have a chance because the system is rigged against outsiders. Hillary picks up pledged delegates that were committed before a vote was cast.

Sanders and Trump reflect a general malaise that American people feel. The Federal government is working against us, not for us, and it is costing far too much.

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Jeb! reneges

photo credit: observer.com

Back in December, and shortly before Jeb! dropped out of the race, Guy Benson at Townhall reported on the GOP candidates' loyalty oath to support whoever became the eventual nominee for President. The headline then was “Jeb: I'm Considering Breaking My GOP Loyalty Pledge if Trump's the Nominee":

By declining to raise their hands when prompted by Fox New anchor Bret Baier, every other candidate on stage that night made a promise to voters: No matter who is nominated, they'd throw their backing behind his or her campaign, and would rule out an independent run.  

Ironically, that question was crafted specifically for Trump, but now it applies at least as much to moderates like Bush and Kasich as it does to the capricious frontrunner.  If you're seeking the Republican nomination, and if you've vowed to endorse and support the Republican nominee, you shouldn't go back on your word -- neither out of genuine frustration and disgust, nor as a campaign tactic. 

Not only would this be a breach of trust, it would reek of spite. Trump's been smacking Jeb around as a low energy loser for weeks; if the former governor were to follow through on this quasi-threat, Trump could tweak his taunt and cast Bush as a low energy sore loser.  

Jeb and friends have spent tens of millions of dollars so far, yet the campaign has failed to gain traction with voters (to put it kindly).  Reneging on the pledge now would be akin to pouting in the corner -- yet another indignity.  

Sure, guys like Bush and Kasich could use Trump's odious conduct and controversial proposals as a fig leaf to justify their potential reversals, but that would require them to feign shock that Donald Trump is comporting himself like...Donald Trump has always comported himself.  

Plus, it would infuriate a large segment of the Republican base, who would accuse the establishment of demanding party unity in support of "safe" nominees, then refusing to abide by the same standard when they don't get their way. 

Today, The Hill reports that Jeb! has reneged on his pledge.

“In November, I will not vote for Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton, but I will support principled conservatives at the state and federal levels, just as I have done my entire life,” Bush wrote in a Facebook post.

Jeb! does not seem to have a clue about “conservative” principles, nor why Trump would appeal to conservatives who are sick and tired of “conservative” GOPe legislators who promise conservative values on the campaign trail and embrace the liberal agenda once in office.

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Clint Gets It

Imported from a FB posting.

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Party planner

art credit: www.freerepublic.com

GOPe to “We The People” Part 2: 

Drop Dead

(Part 1 is here). 

TheWashington Examiner (probably the most user-UNfriendly website) reports that RNC Chairman Reince Priebus told pro-Cruz Charlie Sykes on WTMJ 620 Radio Tuesday that “the party” is choosing the nominee:

Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus cautioned supporters of Donald Trump who vocally disapprove of the GOP's delegate allocation and selection process.

"By the way, this is a nomination for the Republican Party," Priebus told 620 WTMJ in Wisconsin. "If you don't like the party, then sit down. The party is choosing a nominee."

Priebus said he does not think Trump will run as a third-party candidate, and added that he expects all remaining Republican candidates to support the party's nominee.

As far as the Republican Party elite are concerned, your vote does not count.

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Brokered Convention? More rumors?

Cartoon credit: theocddiaries.com

Charlie Spieringat Breitbart Big Government reports

Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus is, again, shutting down rumors that Speaker Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) will emerge as a consensus candidate at the Republican convention in July, asserting on CNN’s State of the Union that this is very unlikely to happen.

“If anything like that were to happen, which I think is highly, highly unlikely, I think our candidate is someone who’s running, OK? That’s pretty obvious,” he said during an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper.

The RNC chairman, a close friend of Ryan, praised the speaker as someone who “doesn’t seek out these things” and was not interested.

“He doesn’t want to do it. And I know Paul very well,” Priebus insisted.

. . .

Ryan himself dismissed the idea during an interview with Hugh Hewitt this morning, urging his backers to stop floating his name for consideration.

If nominated, I will not run. If elected, I will not serve.

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Establishment candidates galore

cartoon credit: thecomicnews.com

Sundance reported:

Kasich won Ohio; therefore he has to stay in. 

Why?

Because if Kasich dropped out according to Ohio election law all of his 66 delegates become bound to the second place finisher, Donald Trump.

John Kasich cannot exit the race without helping Donald Trump.  Senator Ted Cruz knows this.  Senator Ted Cruz does not want Governor John Kasich to leave the race because of it. Yet Ted Cruz goes on TV demanding a Kasich exit.

When you accept these fundamental truths, you clearly see, yet again, the GOPe scheme involves Ted Cruz.

It sounds outrageous, but it would seem to be confirmed by a Politico story by Eli Stokols:

GOP elites line up behind Ted Cruz

Establishment is increasingly prepared to lose with Cruz

than hand the party to Trump

Republican elders, desperate to stop Donald Trump, are increasingly convinced they would rather forfeit the White House than hand their party to the divisive Manhattan billionaire.

That’s why the party’s establishment is suddenly rallying behind Ted Cruz, a man they’ve long despised and who has little chance, in the view of many GOP veterans, of defeating Hillary Clinton on Election Day.

Read the rest here.

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Governor Kasich: Which party do you belong to?

art credit: thebullelephant.com

From RyanLovelace yesterday at The Washington Examiner (beware of the link; it’s a user-UNfriendly website):

Ohio Gov. John Kasich said he isn't willing to serve as anyone's vice president, but he indicated party affiliation would not matter to him when choosing his own running mate.

After losing the Arizona primary and trailing a candidate who is no longer running for president, Kasich hit the campaign trail in Wisconsin and told voters only he could beat the Democrats in November.

He ruled out the possibility of serving with any GOP nominee, but would not oppose putting a Democrat near the top of the Republican ticket himself in November.

“I'm going to be nobody's vice president, OK?” Kasich said, interrupting a questioner at a town hall in Wauwatosa. "I will not be anybody's vice president. Just so you know."

So, he won’t run for Vice President on the GOP ticket, but if nominated for President by the GOP (presumably nominated at a brokered convention, since mathematically he cannot win with delegates), he’d be happy choosing a Democrat as his running mate?!?!

Who’s side is he on? Actually, it looks like he’s on the side of the elite establishment political class, both GOP and Democrat (the so-called Uniparty). He’s accepted campaign contributions from George Soros and his surrogates; see CTPP’s earlier blog here. The GOPe does not care whether it wins or loses, as long as the elite noses are still in the trough. And Gov. Kasich is part of the elite’s game plan.

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No moderator, only a timekeeper.

Cartoon credit: cagle.com

Television date: The next GOP primary debate is tomorrow, Feb. 13 starting at 9pm, live on CBS, that’s Channel 4 in the greater Cleveland Time-Warner cable network. Moderator is John Dickerson, with panelists Major Garrett and Kimberley Strassel. The field is down to six: Donald Trump, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Jeb Bush, Ben Carson, and John Kasich.

The venue in Greenville, South Carolina holds under 2,000. Audience members are allotted tickets based on their allegiance to the party establishment. Via Sundance:

The New Hampshire debate audience was Old School Republicans who cheered Jeb Bush and jeered the ‘next-in-line-jumper’ Marco Rubio.  However, South Carolina has already shown their most preferential candidate in the North Charleston debate, where party insiders were majority Rubio supporters.  Expect Greenville to be more like the latter than former.

I always thought Newt had a better idea: let the candidates debate amongt themselves:   "No moderator, only a timekeeper.”

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