Free Republic

It's the fall of 2006, and the midst of a very intense General Election here in California... a decision was made by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, his campaign manager Steve Schmidt, and then State-GOP Chairman Duf Sundheim. You see, while the Governor's re-election campaign was going well but the Victory Program was rapidly running out of money heading into the final month. Then came the big decision -- to literally "bet the bank" and have the State GOP take out a THREE MILLION DOLLAR LOAN thus providing the necessary injection of cash into the CRP coffers to run a full campaign...

SACRAMENTO -- Republicans could be on the verge of sinking into political oblivion in California, especially if they continue to take hard-line positions on illegal immigration, experts say. Elections across the state this month left Republicans shut out of all statewide offices. Republicans also failed to gain any new congressional seats and lost one in the Assembly. The failure was in stark contrast to gains made by Republicans across the country, sending the state GOP into a period of self-reflection over the future solvency of the party. "We have a deep problem, not one solved easily," said Duf Sundheim, a...

Republican activists may have breathed a sigh of relief today on learning that Santa Monica City Councilman Bobby Shriver has opted not to run for state attorney general. Now they are working to recruit their own star candidate. Their target is U.S. Atty. Thomas O’Brien. A recruitment effort is being spearheaded by California Republicans Aligned For Tomorrow, or CRAFT, a nonprofit focused on enlisting candidates for statewide office. The organization is bankrolled mostly by corporate leaders who have been seeking for years to move the party more toward the middle. Its chief executive is Duf Sundheim, former chair of the...

CRAFT is a 527 committee launched by last year by Schwarzenegger donors Larry Dodge and Paul Folino, and former Gov. Pete Wilson to recruit the "next generation" of statewide Republicans candidates. It is run by former California Republican Party Chairman Duf Sundheim. Moderate GOP pundit Tony Quinn opined at the time that CRAFT's formation "...shows the money people in the party have no faith in the California Republican party. This group would not exist if not for the fact that Republicans can't win statewide elections." Judging by CRAFT's financial disclosure, I'm not sure those involved know how to run a...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and state Sen. Tom McClintock are California's best-known Republicans. McClintock is the quintessential Republican candidate for statewide office. He is a middle-aged, upper-middle-class, white, male career politician. He currently serves as state senator for the 19th District, where he hasn't lived in years, and is running for Congress in the 4th District, where he not only doesn't live, but can't even vote. McClintock is completely inflexible and incapable of compromise, and as a result, receives little to no Republican support in Sacramento. He regularly gets beaten in statewide elections, having lost races for state controller, lieutenant governor...

LOS ANGELES, (AP) -- A splinter group of Republicans with ties to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and financed by six-figure donations will recruit candidates with hopes of reversing the party's disappointing record in recent statewide elections. Disclosure of the group Tuesday — California Republicans Aligned for Tomorrow — comes at a time when the California Republican Party has been struggling with financial and management problems and factional strife between moderates and conservatives. A list of supporters comes from across the party's political spectrum, but the organization appears geared to promoting Republicans who can compete statewide in a state that leans Democratic....

No one would have guessed who's lining up behind whom in California's GOP presidential primary contest. It's got lots of people scratching their heads. Rudy Giuliani, former mayor of New York, is getting endorsements from key California conservatives despite the fact he is pro-choice, pro-gun control, pro-gay rights. Bill Simon, a dyed-in-the-wool conservative who ran an unsuccessful campaign for governor in 2002, is selling Giuliani to some of the state's most conservative leaders. Simon worked for Giuliani when he headed the U.S. Attorney's office in New York. The two were eating breakfast together in New York on the morning of...

The California Republican Party is embroiled in controversy over its refusal to allow the fastest growing voter group – independents – to vote in presidential primary elections, even though Democrats do. The dispute pits Republicans who believe the party must preserve partisan purity at all costs against those who contend the party is undermining its long-range viability by stiffing nearly 20 percent of the state's voters when membership in both major political parties in California is at an all-time low. “At the end of the day, this really is an issue of who it is that should be choosing a...

Sen. John McCain's campaign is mounting a stealth effort to change Republican presidential nomination rules in California to allow independents to vote in the Feb. 5 primary, party and campaign officials in the state have told The Washington Times. The impact could be huge -- and potentially damaging to former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, currently the most acceptable to traditional-values voters among the three top-tier Republican presidential candidates. "If California changes its delegate selection rules to allow independent voters to participate in the Republican primary, it would be very helpful for McCain and for Rudy Giuliani, who historically have done...

(The Ron he refers to at the beginning is Ron Nehring who is running unopposed to be elected the new California Republican Party Chair this morning. He is described as working with national anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist, according to the Associated Press. Norquist is famous for his quote: "My goal is to cut government in half in twenty-five years, to get it down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub." ) Arnold Schwarzenegger: Thanks, Ron, for that great introduction. You have a tough act to follow but everyone here knows you will be an outstanding party...

For the past four years, Duf Sundheim has been walking a tightrope between the really, really conservative wing of the California Republican Party and the party's "still pretty conservative but we like to win an election occasionally" bloc. But with the end of his four-year term just a few days away, the party chairman made it clear this morning that his money is on the pragmatists. --snip-- For people who don't spend a lot of time hanging around GOP activists, "broad coalition" is the code phrase for blacks, Latinos, moderate Republicans, decline-to-state voters and the occasional conservative Democrat. Who, as...

Dear Fellow Republican, Over the last few days, there has been some discussion in blogs and among CRP members regarding the state of the California Republican Party’s finances. There has been speculation about the Party’s debt and how it will be retired. Let me set the record straight. It is true that we incurred debt during the 2006 campaign to finance our unprecedented efforts on behalf of our candidates. Some of the money was an investment in building the infrastructure that will be vital to our work in future elections. Governor Schwarzenegger and his team know that our efforts were...

I have enjoyed reading articles about the election, some of which I agree with, others I do not. But as Daniel Patrick Moynihan once said, "Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." And the fact is the California Republican Party is much stronger today than it was three years ago. In 2002, a Republican "red tide" did not stop California Democrats from winning every statewide office. Pundits, Republican and Democrat, said Republicans could not win in this "bluest of blue states." Just four years later, in the worst year for Republicans nationally since 1974, those...

BEVERLY HILLS--Sometime before midnight on election night, it was clear that despite the governor's easy re-election, the Democratic wave was sweeping over California. Early returns showed conservative darling Tom McClintock ahead of Democrat John Garamendi, results that drew enthusiastic cheers from Republican delegates still rummaging amid the orange, green and white balloons that had dropped after Schwarzenegger's victory speech. But as the vote totals filtered in from around the state, it became clear that California was in the midst of another big Democratic year. By Wednesday morning, Republicans woke up to find themselves in familiar territory. So what is to...

LOS ANGELES - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's comeback coup wasn't all bad for state Democrats. As the Republican governor cruised to victory on a largely Democratic platform Tuesday, he set the stage for some of the Democratic Party's rising stars who aspire to the job themselves. Many were positioning themselves for the 2010 gubernatorial contest - when Schwarzenegger will be termed out - even as they campaigned for their lackluster candidate, Phil Angelides. Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, a charismatic personality markedly different from Angelides, tops the list. He already has demonstrated his own brand of partisanship, working with the governor...

Call to the Convention Letter by Chairman Duf Sundheim The Summer 2006 Convention at the Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles is rapidly approaching and you won't want to miss it. Governor Schwarzenegger heads the program, but that is just the beginning. Governor Romney, one of the leading candidates for the 2008 Presidential election, our excellent slate of statewide candidates, and other events insure the convention will be a national level event. The last three years have been some of the most successful in the history of the California Republican Party. This November's election will determine whether that period was...

With all the talk about the former red state, Republican state, California, becoming a blue state -- which is not quite as true as some think -- there is someone talking about it becoming a purple state. That is California Republican Party chairman Duf Sundheim, who talked about his hopes for California during last week’s bus tour kicking off Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s re-election campaign against Democratic challenger Phil Angelides. The Silicon Valley lawyer came on a few years ago to put a moderate face on the party, whose apparatus was traditionally viewed as right wing and increasingly out of step...

Toscana Country Club Indian Wells, California 6:05 P.M. PDT THE PRESIDENT: Please be seated. Thanks for coming. The lesson of the 1994 fundraiser is, I should have had a better chairman. (Laughter.) I want to thank you all for coming. I really appreciate your support for the Republican Party. We're the party that is the party of ideas, a party of optimism, and a party of people who know how to solve problems, which is exactly what we're doing. I, first, wish Laura were here. She's not, of course. About four people go through the photo-op line indicated that they...

Pro-Arnold forces in the California Republican Party (Sundheim, Kingsley, Parsky) took a few more big steps toward tamping down the rebellion on the right this afternoon at the party’s state convention in San Jose. First, state Senator Tom McClintock, the party’s conservative favorite, delivered a very well-received luncheon address in which he extolled the virtues of his “running mate,” Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. McClintock, who ran a respectably distant third in the 2003 recall election, is running for lieutenant governor. Then conservative leaders found most of their resolutions criticizing Arnold’s policy positions shot down in the party resolutions committee. The rightists...

SACRAMENTO – Republican activists’ efforts to get their party to formally denounce Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s policies are gaining momentum, but not their proposal to yank the GOP’s endorsement of him for the November election. The chairman of the state party in recent days agreed to help get three proposed resolutions against the governor’s budget, public works and minimum wage hike plans a "full and fair hearing" at the GOP convention in San Jose later this month. Party chairman Duf Sundheim helped tweak the resolutions over the weekend so that they now avoid any direct attack against Schwarzenegger. "There are 1,400...