What the Raleigh crowd REALLY thinks about the rest of us
Not too long ago, the common practice following a tough primary / intra-party election was to reach out to the defeated side, kiss-and-make-up, and then prep for the upcoming battle against the other side. But what about when “the other side” is actually a bunch of folks registered in the same party you are?
You’ve all heard about the sketchy, fishy deal hatched in DC where Michael Whatley got traded to the RNC in DC, while RNC goon Jason Simmons got promoted to state party chairman. Despite the fix being in, grassroots operatives staged a valiant effort to try and block the deal.
The grassroots challenge failed – as have many similar efforts since the coup against Hasan Harnett. Were there any conciliatory outreach efforts to try and unite the party ahead of a tough November fight? Read the following comments from our site and judge for yourself.
And here’s the “reply”:
And then there was THIS:
The fight inside the North Carolina Republican Party is not over issues or ideology or the direction of 
the party. It’s about control. It’s a battle between the “beautiful” Raleigh people and the grassroots “nerds.” It’s not a political movement, in the eyes of many in our capital city, It’s an exclusive coterie or cotillion. Strategy and decisions are hammered out with all the diligence and thoughtfulness of an ‘American Idol’ vote.
It’s the kind of arrogance you see in the above comments that fuels things like mass registration shifts from Republican to Unaffiliated. A lot of the Raleigh insiders seriously believe they’d be fine without all of these ideologues from out of town. But how many political campaigns have you seen — where ‘worker bees’ were chased off and discouraged — that succeeded?
Along these same lines, we actually have members of the GOP Raleigh cabal conspiring to sabotage the campaign of DPI GOP nominee Michele Morrow. Top aides to state senators Vicki Sawyer and Phil Berger have been spotted on social media trashing Morrow and musing about: (1) having her removed from the ballot, (2) organizing a ”Republicans for Mo Green” operation, or (3) initiating a write-in campaign.
Are their bosses aware of this? Do they approve?
Again, we have a rare case where a grassroots candidate knocked off a favorite of the Raleigh cabal. Instead of living up to the sermon the NCGOPe preach to us each year — unite for the sake of “the party” — some in the Raleigh cabal would prefer to see a victory by Marxist-leaning Democrat Mo Green than a win by a GOPer who has some intriguing ideas about reforming public education and is more conservative than they are.
There are a lot of people in the NCGOP establishment who believe the GOP rose to power in that town because they are so fabulous, good looking, and such fabulous cocktail party conversationalists. The very thought of grassroots folks living outside the belt line or even Wake County, is often met with eye-rolls and bemused snickers. *The folks in fly-over, or drive-thru country, are good for putting up campaign signs, passing out palm cards, and voting.*
THAT is about it in the eyes of the Raleigh clique. The hard work is done by those people, while the Raleigh clique gets on TV, gets in the room with the governor or president, and fields phone calls from Capitol Hill, the RNC or The White House.
During the period they’ve had a stranglehold on the NCGOP, the Raleigh crowd has subjected the state party to an embarrassing FBI bribery probe, reckless abandonment of key components of the party platform, and poor fundraising performance leading to multiple prop-ups by the powers-that-be in DC.
Why keep hoping that Lucy will finally allow Charlie Brown to kick the football? If these people in Raleigh can’t get over themselves, and start acting like actual teammates, let’s allow them to see what life would be like all by themselves on the political battlefield.
I’m sure there are bad apples in all groups, but I can’t imagine a conservative Kane supporting delegate sending a pic of a toilet filled with feces to a Whatley supporter… as a Whatley groupie did in response to a text encouraging them to register for the state convention and vote Kane.
And I can’t imagine a conservative GOP leader asking a fellow Republican how we got THEIR email address, as if she’s the Princess of Monaco, ??
It is difficult to not paint all the liberal Republicans with the same brush.
Surely they’re not all elitist scum who use people for their own agendas.
The thing is when an insider wins in the Republican Party the indignant demand rises up to come together and support the party. When an insider loses to a conservative Republican there is no such expectation. Rather, the schemers immediately begin to undermine the conservative and sell him/her out to any alternative. Such is their definition of unity. Folks that’s not unity. That’s subjugation. When I say screw them, that’s actually not an action. It’s a reaction.
The Democrats are relatively unified. They are unified in their globalism, Marxism and their corruption. The Republicans at this point are not unified by those things, but they are controlled by them. In recent years as the corrupt Republican establishment has become less subtle and more brazen and arrogant many have left the party. The unaffiliated ranks of people with no party have swollen to substantial numbers.
A lot of the patriots still in the Republican Party are there for ballot access. Even then, it is a difficult road to travel. There is the primary against the establishment toady, or self-serving stooge candidate. If successful, on to the general election to face the Democrat without Republican Party support and oftentimes with Republican Party opposition.
The other way to oppose the uni-party is to start a new party. That is a difficult way for ballot access too. Such is the situation at the local, state and national levels for patriots in this very flawed and crumbling Republic.
I am one of those worker bee nerds who despise the “I’m better than you” Country Club crowd. I am however of the thought there are more of us than of the arrogant control freaks, who are stupid enough to put in writing their disdain for those of us “not in the club”. Here is something those eye-rolling Raleigh clique types do not understand and that is that the grassroots nerds are not going away and eventually the power will change hands. If Jason Simmons had any leadership qualities, he would immediately call out the Raleigh establishment and attempt to unify the party. I am not holding my breath.
Phil Berger has been down the party disloyalty track before. In 2020, his liberal top aide Brent Woodcox was caught on social media just before the election trashing Donald Trump, yet he kept his job with Berger in spite of that. Then, in 2022, Phil Berger himself openly and brazenly endorsed a liberal Democrat judge who was in a competitive race with a Republican challenger. If the Plan of Organization were followed, Berger should have been kicked out of the party for that. It looks to me like Phil Berger ought to be deemed an Undocumented Democrat.
Which Berger aide is up to the party disloyalty this time? Is it Woodcox again?
I was at a gun show recently where a couple of guys who are now registered Republican had a table passing a petition to get the Constitution Party back on the ballot. A number of other Republicans stopped by while I was chatting with them, although only one signed their petition. It was an interesting conversation. Thom Tillis and Phil Berger seem to be absolutely toxic with gun rights voters and it is easy to see why. Everybody was strongly pro-Trump, including the guys passing the petition. There seemed to be an acceptance of Mark Robinson although everyone there said Dale Folwell would have been both a more electable and a ;more trustworthy nominee. One primary winner who was highly toxic was Brad Briner, due to the fact that he works for gun control advocate Michael Bloomberg. It looks like a lot of pro-gun voters will be skipping Briner on the November ballot.
The Raleigh GOP establishment will one day crash and burn. Just give them time. Such arrogance can’t last for long.
In the 1980’s, when I was a young(er) activist, there was a “truce” struck between the two leading factions in the Republican Party. Those were identified with Gov. Jim Martin and Sen. Jesse Helms. The division was geographic (Martin was from Mecklenburg and commanded support in the western Piedmont and western counties), Helms was from Raleigh and had strong support in the eastern Piedmont, Sandhills, and in the East. The split was ideological: Martinites were economic conservatives, Helmsites were social conservatives. And it was stylistic: Martin preferred coalitions and negotiations, Helms was bold and unapologetic. The two sides coexisted uneasily until the 1986 US Senate primary between Jim Broyhill (Martin-backed) and David Funderburk (Helms-backed). It was a bruising primary that led to the GOP’s loss in the Fall to Democrat Terry Sanford. Afterwards, there were informal meetings and then a formal parlay – it may have been at Raleigh’s Angus Barn – between representatives of the two sides. Brad Hayes and Bob Bradshaw represented Martin, Helms was represented by Carter Wrenn and Tom Ellis. The latter two led the conservative Congressional Club. While I was not in attendance, I heard about the summit and knew two of the four men. The details may be fuzzy but I believe a meeting happened along those lines. In any case, agreement was reached to 1) discourage future, divisive primaries, 2) keep a “lid” of intraparty infighting by “sharing” party appointments and other opportunities, and 3) back a candidate for Chair of the state GOP who was acceptable to both sides and who would enforce the truce. That Chairman was Jack Hawke, whom I also knew and worked with.. What followed was a relatively stable period of Republican growth and success that laid the groundwork for today’s GOP majorities in the General Assembly, the Courts, and in the Congressional delegation. All because Gov. Martin and Sen. Helms put their egos aside and understood that Republican conflict only benefits Democrats. We need to get back to that. – Andy Nilsson, running for RNC Committeeman.
Martin and Helms were never hostile to each other, and both were conservatives, although with different styles. Neither made an endorsement in the 1986 Senate primary although some key supporters of each were engaged on the different sides. The Congressional Club did back Dr. Barry McCarty (who was actually a Jim Martin appointee as chairman of the NC Social Services Commission) against Jack Hawke for the chairmanship in 1987.. However, that was a period of factional peace and solid growth in the NCGOP. I served on the Central Committee under both Bradshaw and Hawke (as well as under several other state chairmen) and Hawke was undoubtedly the best chairman the party has had in the last half century (the only ones who were close were Frank Rouse, 1971-73 and Dave Flaherty,1979-85).
There is another subsequent period that reminds me of what we are witnessing in the party currently, that was the Cobey era (or as some on the old discussion board on Carter Wrenn’s Talking About Politics site used to cal it the “Cobey dynasty”), a period when the party was transformed from the “Bottom Up” type of organization we had prior to that point to the “Top Down” mode we have seen since. We saw a small inbred clique control succession to the chairmanship from 1999 to 2013, and this is when the state chairman asserted control of naming the officers who are elected by the state executive committee. Prior to that time, these officers ran in open elections, campaigned for themselves, and the state chairman did not get involved. Since then, they have been virtual appointments, and that has changed a lot of the dynamics on the central committee for the worse.
That is also the time that the state executive committee started to be treated as a rubber stamp, instead of being the governing body of the party as it is supposed to be. I can remember the pre-Cobey days when state chairmen brought their proposals to the ExCom for approval, not merely reported what they had done. Indeed, when Bob Bradshaw was chairman, a written campaign plan of about 60 pages was provided to the ExCom for review and approval detailing state party operations in the 1986 general election campaign. Most other chairmen made their proposals verbally, perhaps with a written outline.
What I saw Tuesday was the old Cobey playbook in action, a small group trying to dictate succession to the chairmanship, getting endorsements for their chosen crown prince from officials in Washington, DC who had little knowledge of what was actually going on in the party, setting up the meeting in a way to give their crown prince a head start over anyone else, and having the succession happen before the executive committee so their chosen one could run at the convention as an incumbent. It is exactly the way the Cobey clique used to do it.
I am also aware of how this incestuous Cobey clique impacted the grassroots. In talking with Jack Hawke when he was working as the consultant for Pat McCrory’s first campaign, he told me of the difficulty he was having in finding qualified and competent people to serve as county chairmen for the campaign. He had not been involved with the party organization since leaving as state chairman in 1995 and was shocked to find how much the wealth of talent available within the party had shrunk. He started looking up people who had been active back when he was chairman and got a number of them to agree to get back into politics to help with the campaign. When he asked why people had dropped out, the answer was mostly disgust with the top-down leadership attitude from the state party during the Cobey era.
If our party is to grow and thrive, we need leadership who will restore that Botton-Up way of operating and junk the repressive Top-Down arrangement we have had since Cobey. Our ability to deliver North Carolina for Trump and the rest of the GOP ticket would be greatly enhanced if we had leadership that put us back on that path.
I got a question about my comment above, specifically about how the change in electing the lower party officers impacted the dynamics of the Central Committee. Since others way wonder about that, I will explain here.
As long as the party operated as intended, the state chairman had two appointed Central Committee officers, the Finance Chairman and Assistant while the State Executive Committee elected first eight and later six officers (the Treasurer, Secretary, General Counsel, and their assistants, and initially also a Director of Minority Affairs and an assistant). All have a voice on the Central Committee, which often is as important as a vote, and all but the assistants also had a vote.
Pre-Cobey, two statewide officers owed their positions to the state chairman and six owed them to the ExCom. These six officers were, in effect, the ExCom’s voice on the Central Committee. Now the state chairman has eight and the ExCom zero. This is only one of the ways the ExCom has been neutered as to its influence in the party beginning in the Cobey era.
I was overseas when Hassan Harnett ran for chairman, but in keeping up with the race, I noted he said he was for “the grassroots”. However, I found out that he played the same old Cobey era trick of ramrodding his slate for the lower party officers. It is time we had a chairman who understands how a party where power flows from the bottom up really works. Operating a party from the top down stiffles creativity and enthusiasm in the ranks. Some of the most successful state chairmen the NCGOP has had in the last half century served without having this power bloc on the Central Committee.
As Sara Smith states, the grassroots lost.
Yes, grassroots did lose. But did you see how many people they had to beckon in order to ensure victory? Has there ever been so many state legislators in one place this side of a pedophilia oyster roast? Grassroots made them work, as opposed to the cakewalk coronation they believed they had. Be proud of your Simmons victory today, but remember, the more significant victory for grassroots was getting rid of Whatley out of NC.
Have you ever been at a job where someone calls for a reference for a new applicant? Are you going to tell them the guy was a dirtbag? Heck no! What you say is Urkel is the best guy ever. We’re sad to lose him, but good luck with his job. Celebrate your Simmons victory, but ding dong Whatleys is gone, and Simmons will join him once PJT wins.
Whatley gone? Unfortunately, no is isn’t. He has just installed his little puppet Simmons to go on running the party. Simmons has been accustomed to taking orders from Whatley as ED, and he will continue doing so with the new arrangement. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
Would Simmons have gotten any votes at all if he were not “Whatley’s boy”? Unlikely. Simmons and Whatley both know that Whatley is responsible for Simmons being where he is, and that is what will be the key point in their relationship going forward.
One expects an outgoing chairman to create a level playing field for those running to succeed him, but that did not come close to happening on this occaision. Everything was rigged to try to transfer power to Simmons. Simmons was in the loop on what was happening from the beginning so he could announce his candidacy immediately after Whatley announced he was resigning. Simmons workers were given access to the meeting room ahead of time to put literature on chairs but neither of the other candidates were given that access. We even saw Whatley and Susan Mills grossly misuse their reports at the ExCom meeting to push Simmons. Mills totally wore out her welcome with a lot of folks doing that. It was more expected of Whatley.
This is the very sort of intra-party hardball that our candidates for elected public office do NOT need in a critical election year.
DC is not far enough away for Whatley. Hopefully, after Trump is reelected, he will make Whatley an ambassador to some faraway place where we will never hear from him again. And we can expect Simmons to throw away his new title after the election to use his newly enhanced resume for a plum position in a new Trump administration. We can also expect a new ExCom meeting in the spring to annoint whoever the Whatley mafia put forward to replace Simmons.
Great to read Steve Rayder’s perspective on this era. While it is true Jim Martin and Jesse Helms were not antagonistic, they definitely had different styles and led different groupings. Bob Bradshaw, for whom I worked, said as much, as has Carter Wrenn. When Martin picked Jim Broyhill to fill John East’s seat, that set in motion the Funderburk candidacy. None other than Jim Broyhill, in whose campaign I served, shared his frustration with the Congressional Club for recruiting and backing Funderburk. Jack Hawke was key to getting the N.C. GOP over that divide.
Here’s what “the rest of us” REALLY think about “the Raleigh crowd,” and especially the two clowns in the photo. They are petty, unaccomplished men, undeserving of the positions of power and influence they hold. They’re not there because of what they know or what they’ve done; they’re only there because of who they know, and who they manipulate.
I’ll write everyday how happy I was tha Jim lost. The Jim team with the his mountain hags are willing to say anything and hurt anyone to win. Glad he lost. Hope it continues.
I know, right? All Jim’s talk about patriotism, and legislating based on the Party’s Platform? Yuck.
Womack working to secure our election from fraud? Complete waste of time. NC’s elections are clean, idiot.
Lee Co growing their margin for Trump while the State’s went down, the need to elect an R Gov and AG which Whatley failed to do? All Lies.
(Don’t look at the results, just trust Whatley’s narrative is true). https://er.ncsbe.gov/?election_dt=11/03/2020&county_id=53&office=ALL&contest=0
Right there with you, JoeyS. Sure am glad (Team Whatley) Michele Nix flipped off that one Mountain Hag at the central committee meeting. That’ll show her. Hope Nix sticks out her tongue next time.
Whatley likes to claim credit for things he is not responsible for, and that has gotten him to RNC chairman. We haven’t had a decent RNC chairman since Lee Atwater died, and Whatley certainly is not it. Rona McDaniel was awful in that position, so there is little direction to go but up. However, there were a lot of better choices than Whatley.
And why do we need Whatley’s poodle, Simmons, as his successor? He takes after Whatley, claiming credit for the very same things Whatley claimed credit for. Whatley was Tillis’ handpicked chairman, so is Tillis the one really behind Simmons, too?