Identifying the current chair of the Michigan Republican Party is far more difficult than it probably should be.
Last month, state party officials voted to oust Kristina Karamo as the head of the state party. Karamo said she didn’t recognize the legitimacy of that vote and insisted that she remained the chair of the Michigan Republican Party. Her intraparty opponents chose former Rep. Pete Hoekstra to replace her, leading to widespread confusion over who’s in charge.
As The New York Times reported, the Republican National Committee decided to help resolve the conflict.
After a bitter monthlong fight in Michigan over who has a valid claim to lead the G.O.P. in the critical battleground state, the Republican National Committee said on Wednesday that it had formally recognized Pete Hoekstra as the state party’s rightful chairman.
So, that settles that? Of course not. Karamo released a 10-minute-long video, by way of the state party’s social media account, claiming that she is still the chair of the Michigan Republican Party — in part because, as Karamo sees it, the RNC doesn’t have the authority to remove her.
For those who might benefit from a refresher, in the 2022 elections, Karamo ran for Michigan secretary of state campaign as a notorious election denier. She was also known for sharing concerns about “demonic possession” — which the Republican said can spread from person to person through intimate relationships — spreading Jan. 6 conspiracy theories, rejecting vaccines, condemning evolutionary biology, and suggesting that cohabitation before marriage opens the door to normalizing pedophilia.
She lost by 14 points.
Trump nevertheless urged Michigan Republicans to make Karamo the state party chair, and local officials followed the former president’s instructions. That hasn’t worked out well for the Michigan GOP.
The former president then abandoned her and backed Hoekstra, though Karamo apparently doesn’t care.
In fact, she described the faction that voted to replace her as an “impostor organization fraudulently claiming to be the Michigan Republican Party.” The Times’ report added that the state party — at least the part that Karamo claims to control — will take “appropriate steps” to protect its leaders’ interests.
I’m not altogether sure what that means, though an MLive report added, “Karamo still controls the party’s bank accounts and assets, and her unyielding stance means the issue will almost certain end up in court.”
As for Hoekstra, if the former congressman’s name sounds at all familiar, there’s a good reason for that.
Circling back to our earlier coverage, Hoekstra has long been a curious figure in GOP politics, and regular readers might recall a 2017 incident in which the former congressman became the butt of jokes after making some strange claims about the Netherlands — and then getting caught lying about it to a Dutch news outlet.
But even more importantly, Hoekstra developed a reputation during his congressional career of mishandling sensitive information, despite having led the House Intelligence Committee.
All of which is to say, the Michigan Republican Party is either led by an election denier who has odd thoughts about demons, or a former congressman who was credibly accused of leaking like a sieve. Trump supported the former, but now prefers the latter.
Watch this space.
This post updates our related earlier coverage.