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Pay to Play?
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PLAY? PAY to
California GOP leadership accused of pay-to-play scheme for political endorsements
BY BRAD JONES
Anaheim, calif.—a political firestorm over alleged pay-to-play politics at the recent California Republican Party convention has burned some candidates who have claimed party leadership used proxy votes to favor establishment candidates for endorsements.
After the reelection campaign for state Sen. Brian Dahle’s wife, Assemblywoman Megan Dahle, gave a $40,500 donation to the GOP on April 22, the first day of the weekend-long convention, gubernatorial candidate Jenny Rae Le Roux made the pay-to-play allegation in a text message sent out to Republican delegates that was later leaked on social media.
“Last night at 8:15 pm, Megan Dahle made a payment from her campaign account to the CAGOP. Two hours later 400 proxies were given to her husband’s campaign for Governor by party leadership,” Le Roux wrote in the text message.
“We are not the party of rigged elections. The Republican endorsement should not be for sale. I am calling for the return of the suspicious payment and for everyone to vote their conscience tomorrow.”
The next morning, California Assembly Republican Leader James Gallagher sent an email to delegates stating that he had asked Megan Dahle for the donation.
“I asked for and Megan Dahle gave money to the Party that goes directly to helping win the Assembly seats. Period. End of story,” he wrote.
“Anything else is just desperate politics. A Governor candidate should know that we need to win all the way down the ticket. Brian Dahle is a proven leader and he deserves our nomination today.”
In response, Le Roux also sent an email to delegates.
“I stand by my position that endorsements should be earned, not bought,” she wrote.
“Megan Dahle’s transfer to the party just hours before those assignments was over 5X the size of any prior contribution. ... Many of you have known for years that these deals are regularly made. I found the courage to lead with
Jenny Rae Le Roux,
gubernatorial candidate
Rachel Hamm, candidate for California secretary of state
my own conviction.”
Sen. Dahle, who has held elected public office for more than 25 years, was endorsed by the party for governor at the convention.
Dahle told Insight via text message that he couldn’t respond to a request for comment.
Le Roux alluded to the pay-to-play scandal during her campaign speech at a candidates’ forum at the convention, alleging that the endorsement had been “purchased” just before organizers cut her mic. She asked the party to return the money.
Ellie Hockenbury, a CAGOP spokesperson, told Insight on April 25 that the $40,500 was a routine donation. (Top) Jenny Rae Le Roux talks to a supporter in the lobby at the California Republican Party convention in Anaheim, Calif., on April 23. (Above) Rachel Hamm mingles with supporters in the lobby at the California Republican Party convention. Hamm said RINOs and “liberal infiltrators” have risen into key party leadership positions and are trying to destroy the party from within.
“This is a routine member contribution to the Assembly Republican Caucus. Nothingburger,” Hockenbury said in a text message.
Le Roux confirmed that she wrote the text message and sent it out to delegates, but suggested she had put the incident behind her.
“It’s time to move on,” Le Roux told Insight on April 25.
“I’ve got a race to win,” she said referring to the June 7 Republican primary, “so I can face off with Gavin Newsom in November.”
Rachel Hamm, who is running for secretary of state, also had her speech cut short when the party leadership cut her mic more than a minute before her five-minute time limit had expired.
“I got cut off unjustly,” she told Insight.
Hamm said that according to the CAGOP leadership, she broke the rules to not speak negatively about other Republicans when she encouraged other candidates to be conservatives and “stop running to the middle [and] leaning left.”
Several sources within the party told Insight that the party is controlled
by RINOs, an acronym for “Republicans in Name Only” and that there are rifts between pro-Trump “America First” candidates and the California Republican Party establishment.
Hamm claimed she was told that another candidate was offered an endorsement in exchange for a donation.
She accused party leadership of favoring moderate candidates and smearing those it opposes.
“It’s death by a thousand cuts. They did very specific things to sabotage very specific people, me being one of them,” she said.
Hamm had been the sole Republican candidate for secretary of state until the party recruited others to run against her, she said.
“People on the board began making phone calls … telling people that I was a satanic witch, and therefore they needed someone—for the sake of the greater good for the party—to step up and run for Secretary of State in order to sabotage my campaign,” she said.
Shocked at the allegation, Hamm said she was in a state of disbelief until she heard the same claim from more than 20 people.
“I’m such a strong, outspoken Christian. So, it’s a very weird, stupid lie. It’s so easily just disputed and put to rest … and then I heard it from another person, and then another person,” she said.
Hamm, a Trump supporter, said RINOs and “liberal infiltrators” have risen into key party leadership positions and are trying to destroy the party from within.
Several sources within the GOP said the party is controlled by RINOs, an acronym for ‘Republicans in Name Only.’
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) speaks at the California Republican Party Convention.
Mike Netter, campaign manager for Attorney General candidate Eric Early, told Insight he believes the party leadership conspired to control blank proxy votes to sway which candidates got endorsements.
“The CAGOP used a paid candidate operative to give out hundreds of signed proxy votes to delegates attending the convention and told them to use those hundreds of proxies to vote against the opponents,” he said.
Of the 1,379 eligible delegates, 522 voted at the convention and 534 votes were cast by proxy for other delegates who did not attend.
“No one knows who these proxies are,” Netter said.
Each delegate in attendances can “carry” up to two proxy votes, meaning they can cast up to three ballots—their own and one or two proxy votes, he said.
Although proxy votes require a wet signature from a delegate, the delegate does not have to specify the candidates for whom they are voting. In other words, it’s like a “blank check,” he said.
Netter is calling for more transparency and a breakdown of how many proxy votes were cast for each candidate.
“The California GOP needs to make visible the wet-signature proxies to the delegates,” he said. “There is currently no way to validate that the proxies are valid, and there is no mechanism, rules, or procedures, apparently in place as to how and to what delegates these proxies are distributed.”
Netter said the timing of Megan Dahle’s donation has also created suspicion.
“It’s bad optics,” he said.
“It sure makes delegates and many people in the Republican Party suspicious. We would like someone to come out and show us specifically what that money is used for because it makes delegates not trust the party because everybody thinks proxies are being purchased,” Netter said. “Don’t tell me there’s noth-
ing to look at. Prove me wrong.”
California Republican Assembly (CRA) Regional Vice President Jennye Bigelow told Insight on April 26 that the CAGOP policy of allowing a majority of delegates to vote by proxy opens the door to influence by lobbyists and pay-to-play schemes in which “the proxy votes will go to the highest bidder.”
“The system is designed to favor establishment candidates,” Bigelow said.
“I had several people reach out to me, after the voting on Sunday at the convention confused about the way the system works. They were under the impression it was one delegate, one vote, but they quickly realized it was one delegate with multiple votes,” she said. “The California GOP allows proxy votes, and when you have more proxy votes than actual delegates there to vote, the outcome is always going to be in the favor of the proxies.”
The CRA, though chartered by the California Republican Party, is an independent volunteer organization that makes its own endorsements and does not allow delegates to vote by proxy.
“That’s the reason why endorsements are always different between the CRA and the California GOP,” she said.
“CRA does not allow proxy voting, which means if the delegate doesn’t show up at the convention, there’s no vote. They don’t vote. They cannot give their vote to anybody else,” Bigelow said. “When you use proxy votes the people no longer have a voice. It should be one person, one vote.”
Supporting Moderates
Earlier this year, the party leadership was accused of considering the idea of supporting “moderate Democrats” in the 2022 midterm elections.
When asked by the party secretary about CAGOP’s policy on “possibly either endorsing or unofficially throwing support behind some of the moderate Democrats,” at a meeting on Jan. 22, Chairwoman Jessica Patterson suggested supporting incumbent L.A. County Supervisor Sheila Kuehl, District 3, who is a member of the Democratic Party.
However, party spokesperson Hockenbury later told Insight that the party does not endorse Democrats, which would violate CAGOP’s official bylaws.
Party Endorsements
At the convention in Anaheim on April 24, the CACOP endorsed several other statewide candidates: Mark Meuser for U.S. Senate; Lance Christensen for super-
intendent of public instruction; Nathan Hochman for attorney general; Lanhee Chen for controller; and Angela Underwood Jacobs for lieutenant governor.
“After three days of party building, exceptional speakers, insightful trainings, and official business, our delegates endorsed quality and talented candidates for statewide office,” Patterson said in a statement. “I look forward to supporting them as they challenge California Democrats’ failed one-party rule with visions for a brighter tomorrow.”
The CAGOP board of directors also voted to endorse several candidates for local office. The full list of endorsed candidates can be found on the party’s website.
J.D. Vance, a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate for Ohio, shakes hands with former President Donald Trump during a rally at the Delaware County Fairgrounds in Ohio on April 23.
PHOTO BY DREW ANGERER/GETTY IMAGES
HEN DONALD TRUMP TALKS, “AMERICA FIRST” REPUBLICANS STILL LISTEN. THAT’S WHAT J.D. Vance’s victory in the Ohio Republican U.S. Senate primary on May 3 showed in the first test of Trump’s influence in the 2022 midterm election cycle, Defending Democracy Together Director Bill Kristol says.
“Anybody who dismisses Donald Trump as not a major factor in the party is crazy,” said Dave Carney, a Republican consultant.
In the general election, Vance will face Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio), who handily defeated Morgan Harper and Traci Johnson in the Ohio Democratic U.S. Senate primary.
Vance topped former Ohio State Treasurer and state Rep. Josh Mandel, Ohio state Sen. Matt Dolan, Cleveland investment banker Mike Gibbons, former Ohio Republican Party Chairwoman Jane Timken, central Ohio entrepreneur Mark Pukita, and Columbus businessman Neil Patel.
When the race was called in Vance’s favor, the “Hillbilly Elegy” author and venture capitalist stepped on stage at a victory party in Cincinnati, 45 minutes south of where he grew up in working-class Middletown.
“They wanted to write a story that this campaign would be the death of Donald Trump’s America First agenda,” Vance said. “Ladies and gentlemen, it ain’t the death of the America First agenda.”
Donald Trump Jr., who publicly supported Vance weeks before his father announcedhisendorsementofthefirst-time political candidate on April 15, agreed.
“MAGA is alive and well, and the GOP best take notice and finally understand where the people are,” Trump Jr. wrote on Twitter after Vance’s victory.
Kristol noted that Vance was polling at “about 10 percent” with Mandel and Gibbons leading at 21 percent on April 15. Vance surged in subsequent independent polls before winning by a comfortable margin on May 3.
“Without Trump’s endorsement, Vance almost certainly stalls out at 10 percent and finishes fourth,” Kristol said.
Vance’s victory increases the likeli-
An expert noted that J.D. Vance was polling at “about 10 percent,” with Mandel and Gibbons leading at 21 percent before Trump announced his endorsement.
hood that Trump will ramp up his public support for candidates in upcoming primaries, according to one source close to Trump.
“Vance’s win proves the concept that he can take someone from third or fourth place and pull them into the lead in a crowded primary,” another Trump associate said.
SINCE HE ENTERED the race last July, Vance has faced scrutiny about disparaging remarks he made about Trump in 2016. Club for Growth, a pro-Mandel PAC, poured millions of dollars into attack ads directed at Vance.
When Trump announced his endorsement on April 15, about three dozen Republican Party county leaders in Ohio— and Ohio Value Voters, a conservative group that backed Mandel—wrote a letter urging the former president to rescind his endorsement. In his victory speech, Vance said he would “work hard to earn the support” of his detractors.
“People are caught between the corrupt political class of the left and right,” he said. “They need a representative, and I am that person.”
Timken, who was endorsed by retiring Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio), sought Trump’s stamp of approval. She finished in the distance behind Vance, Mandel, Dolan, and Gibbons.
“While tonight’s results are disappointing, I am incredibly proud of the race we’ve run,” Timken said after the race was called for Vance. “From day one, I’ve focused on a campaign for Ohio, in Ohio, fueled by Ohioans, and that grassroots support was evident throughout.
“I am passionate about the future of this state and country, which is why Republicans must retake the Senate and House in November to right the ship and put a check on Joe Biden’s disastrous policies.
“I congratulate J.D. Vance and fully support him in November.”
Ryan, a longtime Democratic Ohio
VANCE’S VICTORY
INCREASES THE LIKELIHOOD
that Trump will ramp up his public support for candidates in upcoming primaries, according to one source close to Trump. congressman in Youngstown, called for unity before lambasting his general election opponent.
“Vance is an out-of-touch millionaire who’s made a career of bashing the working class and is the worst possible choice to represent Ohio,” Ryan said after his own victory on May 3.
The Senate is equally split at 50–50; Vice President Kamala Harris has the tie-breaking vote, which gives Democrats the majority.
Trump associate
Republican candidate for Senate J.D. Vance, accompanied by his wife, Usha, waves to supporters after winning the primary, at the Duke Energy Convention Center in Cincinnati on May 3.
REPUBLICANS CAN REGAIN control of the Senate by picking up one seat, which enhances the importance of Ohio Republicans holding Portman’s spot.
“I’ve studied this race closely and I think J.D. is the most likely to take out the weak, but dangerous, Democrat opponent—dangerous because they will have so much money to spend,” Trump said in a statement after backing Vance on April 15. “However, J.D. will destroy him in the debates and will fight for the MAGA Movement in the Senate.”
Margot Athon enthusiastically waved a Vance sign at his May 3 victory speech and believes that he’ll “win over” Ohio Republican voters who doubt that he’s a conservative.
“I appreciate his upbringing and his life story,” said Athon, who is from Columbus, Ohio, but now lives in Washington.
“He’s someone who has not been handed anything. He worked for it. He earned it. And those are the elected officials we need in Washington.”
