Turning Point USA founder and CEO Charlie Kirk slammed the re-election of Ronna Romney McDaniel on Friday as the Chairwoman of the RNC, arguing that the party's bigwigs have a "deep-seated contempt" for the grassroots.
McDaniel overcame her main challenger, the RNC’s California national committeewoman Harmeet Dhillon, by a vote of 111 committee members to 51. MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, meanwhile, received four votes.
In a Telegram post, Kirk outlined seven things he had learned after attending the RNC's election ceremony.
1) There are some amazing members that truly love the grassroots. 55 of them listen to you and care about what you think. They are passionate, lovely people who want their country back. They are wonderful.
2) There is a small group of the 111 — likely 10-12 people — that are just scared. They don’t know how to move forward but are terrified of changing the status quo. They voted for Ronna for “continuity not chaos," a weak argument based on fear, not vision.
3) The largest slice of the RNC pie is filled with people who have a deep-seated contempt for the base energy of the party. Several told me to my face that they are annoyed by the grassroots and their “emails” that “bother them.”
4) They told me November was a “raging success” and “historically good.” They told me the party needs fewer people who watch “Steve Bannon, Tucker Carlson and your podcast and more people who read the newspaper.”
5) The exuberance from these consultants when Ronna was elected chair was deafening. They knew what this means: the flow of money will only continue.
6) I am truly shocked at how disconnected the RNC country club is from the people they beg for donations. There is a club of consultants who make insane $ off YOUR donations and are no proud of how they can defy the 98% of the party who wanted to see change.
7) The contempt is real. The attitude is repeatedly expressed as “the volunteers who are upset don’t understand how things work around here”
Speaking to reporters after the vote, Kirk's preferred choice Harmeet Dhillon said she would work toward repairing divisions in the party, but that this process would not be a quick fix.
“We did not expect this to become a national grassroots movement,” she said. “So I’m committed to healing and coming together with folks, but at the end of the day, if our party is perceived as totally out of touch with the grassroots — which I think some may take away from this outcome — we have some work to do.”
McDaniel, meanwhile, pledged a message of party unity heading toward the 2024 election cycle.
“We need all of us,” McDaniel said in her victory speech. “We heard you, grassroots. We know. We heard Harmeet; we heard Mike Lindell… [W]ith us united and all of us joining together, the Democrats are going to hear us in 2024."
