During today's meeting in Dana Point, California, the Republican National Committee (RNC) will decide whether to elect current Chair Ronna McDaniel for a fourth term or to go in a different direction. She faces challenges from attorney Harmeet Dhillon and MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell.
During a recent appearance on "The Charlie Kirk Show," Gov. Ron DeSantis discussed why "the 2022 red wave turned out to be a red ripple" and voiced the need for change at the RNC.
"We've had three substandard election cycles in a row — '18, '20, and '22 — and I would say of all three of those, '22 was probably the worst," DeSantis said. "Given the political environment of a very unpopular President Biden, huge majorities of the people think the country's going in the wrong direction. That is an environment that's tailor-made to make big gains in the House and the Senate and the state houses all across the country, and yet that didn't happen. In fact, we even lost ground in the U.S. Senate. I think we need a change. I think we need to get some new blood in the RNC."
DeSantis went on to commend Harmeet Dhillon's suggestion of getting the RNC out of D.C., saying it should be moved to "real parts of the country" so as to attract real people rather than "D.C. insiders."
"Why would you want to have your headquarters in the most Democrat city in America," he posed.
Without a change of direction, DeSantis believes it will be difficult to energize people to give money and volunteer their time to the RNC, which he says needs to be powered by "grassroots Republicans" and not so reliant on consultants.
In November, the majority of the RNC's voting members — 101 in total — signed a letter endorsing McDaniel's re-election. In 2020, Donald Trump endorsed McDaniel to stay in her position, but earlier this month, he would not give his endorsement to any candidate. "I like them both," he said of McDaniel and Dhillon.
Dhillon previously served as an attorney for the former president, but Trump and his team are reportedly privately advocating for McDaniel.
