State Republicans will finally have their day in court Tuesday as a judge decides whether locally elected party leaders have the right as described in the bylaws to hold a vote and remove state chair Dave Williams.
District Court Judge Thomas W. Henderson in Arapahoe County put a temporary restraining order on local leaders less than 24 hours before the July 27 vote, which grassroots members from across the state had already committed to attending.
It was a minor inconvenience as 120 people showed up anyway to discuss party problems and hear from possible chair replacements.
PeakNation™ will recall the judge is a Gov. Polis appointee, and that the restraining order and court action to stop the vote was sought by Williams.
Complaints about Williams’ mishandling of the party finances are many and the most serious charges against him.
He spent tens of thousands of dollars to promote his own congressional campaign, which he lost. And polluted the neutral spirit of the chairmanship by taking sides in the primary elections and then spending party money on some preferred candidates.
The party’s become a laughingstock, which makes it even harder to get Republicans elected. Full stop. We mean it. Stop.
Williams lawyers he hired with party funds to sue the (checks notes) party will claim the chairman fulfilled the bylaws requirement by holding the meeting that central committee members demanded via petition.
That would be this sham of a meeting vice chair Hope Scheppelman held beneath a bridge in the far reaches of the southwest corner of the state in Bayfield, and then immediately adjourned for lack of a quorum.
No reasonable judge could rule this meeting did not deliberately skirt the spirit of the party bylaws to fulfill the rules of replacing a chairman at a specially called meeting.
How can one miss the absurdity of scheduling an emergency statewide meeting for 400 people to be held in the far reaches of the state under a bridge?
For that matter, can the party hold future meetings on an airplane crossing the state? On a spaceship? The moon?
It’s an insult to every elected member of the state central committee.
Meanwhile, Republican candidates for office are going it alone this election season without GOP assistance while the party fights amongst themselves to get the ship back on course.
Let’s just hope it doesn’t hit an iceberg come November.