Does the Republican National Committee Hate Congressmen?

The Republican National Committee (RNC) excludes members of Congress from serving on the committee. Does that mean the RNC hates Republican Congressmen?

In most states, their state Republican party excludes their state legislators and other elected officials from serving on the Republican state committee. Does that mean Republicans in those states hate or dislike their elected officials?

Obviously, those are silly questions and obviously the answer to both is “no.” Yet some people are claiming a similar rule was just adopted by the Republican State Convention because “a bunch of crazy delegates” dislike Republican elected officials and don’t want them around.

The folks making such a claim forget that the same delegates who voted for the rule change just happen to be local committee members who worked hard to help the elected officials defeat Democrats in the past and who are working hard to reelect Republicans in the coming November election.

Under state party rules prior to the State Convention on Saturday, Republicans elected in a statewide election or to the Arkansas General Assembly are automatically members of the State Committee. The new rule which passed overwhelmingly on Saturday, shifts the elected officials from being voting members to nonvoting members.

Why change the rule to be like the RNC and most other states? The short answer is because Arkansas has gone from being a state with almost no Republican voters to one that is thankfully overwhelmingly Republican.

There was a time when the Republican Party was so small, the State Committee needed more warm bodies to look legitimate. Some former members of the Arkansas House of Representatives would joke that in the 1970’s they had so few Republicans in the House that they could caucus in a phonebooth. Until recent decades, many counties didn’t have any Republican officeholders and didn’t even have a Republican County Committee.

With the success of the Republican Party in Arkansas, there are now 124 elected officials who are automatically members of the State Committee. That includes: all six (6) members of the US Congressional Delegation; all seven (7) of the constitutional officers of the executive branch; former elected Republican governor, US Senator, or US Representative; twenty-nine (29) State Senators, and eighty-two (82) State Representatives. (In addition to the 124 currently elected officials, the rules automatically include former Governors and former members of the U.S. Senate or U.S. House of Representatives, which adds three (3) more at this point in history for a total of 127.)

One hundred twenty-seven (127) elected officials is a huge number when compared to the rest of the State Committee membership. (In addition to elected officials, the State Committee includes party officers who were elected by the party or appointed by the Party Chair, representatives of County Committees, Congressional District Committees, and several allied organizations.)

Not all elected officials attend State Committee meetings but like other members of the committee, they were allowed to designate a proxy to vote on their behalf. Because of the huge number of elected officials on the State Committee, many important issues have been decided by rounding up the most proxy votes from absent elected officials.

It is our understanding that the lopsided representation of elected officials on the State Committee led some county committee members to look at other states and the RNC to see how they handle the issue. Even though total exclusion is the normal rule of practice in most states and the RNC, those wanting to change the rule in Arkansas did not go that far. They chose not to ban membership of elected officials but only to remove their right to vote.

But we must be clear. Even with the new rule, elected officials are not prohibited from serving on the State Committee in another capacity, for example being elected to the county committee as the County Committee’s State Committeeman or State Committeewoman. Second, elected officials are still automatic members of the State Committee and are entitled to participate in meetings even though they do not have a vote.