{"id":16720,"date":"2024-03-09T00:46:21","date_gmt":"2024-03-09T00:46:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/2024\/03\/09\/party-takeover-trump-installs-top-ally-and-daughter-in-law-to-steer-republican-national-committee\/"},"modified":"2024-03-09T00:46:21","modified_gmt":"2024-03-09T00:46:21","slug":"party-takeover-trump-installs-top-ally-and-daughter-in-law-to-steer-republican-national-committee","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/2024\/03\/09\/party-takeover-trump-installs-top-ally-and-daughter-in-law-to-steer-republican-national-committee\/","title":{"rendered":"Party takeover: Trump installs top ally and daughter-in-law to steer Republican National Committee"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\u2013 The Republican Party is once again completely under the thumb of former President Donald Trump.<\/p>\n

The former president\u2019s picks to serve as chair and co-chair of the Republican National Committee (RNC) \u2013\u00a0Trump ally and North Carolina GOP chair Michael Whatley and daughter-in-law Lara Trump \u2013 were unanimously confirmed on Friday by voice votes as the RNC held a recently planned general session.<\/p>\n

\u2018Over the next eight months, the RNC will work hand in glove with President Trump,\u2019 Whatley declared in his acceptance speech.<\/p>\n

And Lara Trump, speaking minutes later, emphasized that \u2018we have one goal. The goal on November 5th is to win. And as my father-in-law says, bigly.\u2019<\/p>\n

Whatley, who was the RNC\u2019s general counsel, succeeded longtime chair Ronna McDaniel, whom Trump picked to steer the national party committee after he won the White House in 2016. Her departure on Friday came after Trump earlier this year repeatedly urged changes at the committee \u2013 after lackluster fundraising last year and his opposition to the RNC\u2019s presidential primary debates \u2013 which essentially pushed McDaniel out the door.<\/p>\n

\u2018The state of our party is strong,\u2019 McDaniel declared in her departure speech.<\/p>\n

And pointing to the RNC\u2019s fundraising rebound in January and February, McDaniel touted \u2018the best two months of fundraising the RNC has ever had when we didn\u2019t occupy the White House.\u2019<\/p>\n

While fundraising will be a major focus going forward, as the Trump campaign and the RNC aim to compete with the rival Democratic National Committee and President Biden\u2019s campaign, continuing and beefing up already existing RNC programs dedicated to election integrity will also be a top priority.<\/p>\n

\u2018Everyone in this room and every voter across the country knows that we must protect the sanctity of their vote,\u2019 said Whatley, who\u2019s been a strong supporter of Trump\u2019s unproven claims that his 2020 election loss to Biden was due to massive voter fraud.<\/p>\n

After highlighting that he \u2018worked closely with Chairwoman McDaniel to build our election integrity program from scratch,\u2019 Whatley stressed \u2018we will do more.\u2019<\/p>\n

Trump also installed campaign adviser Chris LaCivita as RNC chief of staff. LaCivita, a longtime Republican strategist and RNC veteran, will continue to keep his role as one of the two top advisers steering Trump\u2019s 2024 presidential campaign.<\/p>\n

\u2018The RNC today. It\u2019s not going to look the same next week. There\u2019s obviously going to be changes,\u2019 LaCivita told reporters ahead of the gathering. But he declined to get into details.<\/p>\n

The RNC gathering came in the same week Trump swept 14 of the 15 GOP primaries and caucuses on Super Tuesday \u2013 which moved him much closer to officially locking up the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. It also comes just two days after Trump\u2019s last rival for the nomination \u2013 former U.N. ambassador and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley \u2013 dropped out of the race.<\/p>\n

\u2018He\u2019s the presumptive nominee. He\u2019s going to be our nominee. He\u2019s going to be the guy to beat Joe Biden, and it\u2019s normal for the presumptive nominee of the party to run the RNC,\u2019 longtime RNC committee member from Mississippi, Henry Barbour, told Fox News on the eve of the meeting.<\/p>\n

New Hampshire GOP chair and former RNC committee member Chris Ager, who attended the meeting, emphasized that \u2018Donald Trump is the presumptive nominee and this is the party of Trump.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018The people at the RNC know and like Mike Whatley, so he\u2019s a good choice and Lara Trump is a trusted adviser to the president, so why not give him the tools he needs to get the job done. If he trusts those people, let\u2019s give him what he needs to get that win in November,\u2019 Ager told Fox News ahead of the meeting.<\/p>\n

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Trump\u2019s takeover of the RNC is far from controversial. It is traditional, as a presidential election cycle moves from the primaries to the general election for the presumptive nominee of the party out of power, to take control and merge operations.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Barbour emphasized that while \u2018there\u2019s always some drama\u2019 at RNC meetings, \u2018it\u2019s really important that the party pull together\u2026 and we need the former president leading us on that, bringing us together as a party so we can win not just the White House but the Senate, the House, state, local.\u2019<\/p>\n

However, there was some controversy in recent weeks over concerns that the cash-strapped RNC would be forced to pay some of Trump\u2019s massive legal bills.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The former president faces four major criminal trials and a total of 91 indictments, as well as a $355 million civil fraud judgment which Trump\u2019s appealing. A political action committee affiliated with the former president has shelled out nearly $80 million in the past two years to pay Trump\u2019s many lawyers.<\/p>\n

The RNC paid some of Trump\u2019s legal bills when he was in the White House and after he left office. However, McDaniel said two years ago that the committee would stop paying those bills once Trump became a candidate again.<\/p>\n

LaCivita said in recent days that the RNC would not be paying the bills. The Trump campaign told Fox News on Wednesday that the committee would \u00a0\u2018absolutely not\u2019 be providing any of its funds to alleviate Trump\u2019s legal costs.<\/p>\n

\u2018Hard no. Absolutely not. Asked and answered,\u2019 a spokesperson reiterated.<\/p>\n

Barbour recently proposed a non-binding resolution stating that RNC funds could not be used for Trump\u2019s legal bills. However, the resolution was nixed after Barbour was unable to earn the support of RNC members from at least 10 states.<\/p>\n

\u2018A small group of us offered a resolution to the committee that essentially said that the number one job and the only job of the RNC is to win elections. And if that\u2019s our job, we need to spend our money on that and not on paying anybody\u2019s legal bills,\u2019 Barbour told Fox News.<\/p>\n

He emphasized that \u2018while we came up short\u2026 it was an important conversation and the Trump campaign has confirmed indeed that they have no plans to spend any RNC dollars on it and will not do it.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018We appreciate that very much,\u2019 he noted.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

This post appeared first on FOX NEWS<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u2013 The Republican Party is once again completely under the thumb of former President Donald Trump. The former president\u2019s picks to serve as chair and co-chair of the Republican National Committee (RNC) \u2013\u00a0Trump ally and North Carolina GOP chair Michael Whatley and daughter-in-law Lara Trump \u2013 were unanimously confirmed on Friday by voice votes as <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":16721,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-16720","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-politics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16720","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16720"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16720\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16721"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16720"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16720"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16720"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}