2024 election: Republican state parties in disarray ahead of crucial contests

Arizona could very well be the decisive state in next year’s presidential election. Sadly for the GOP, the state’s Republican Party appears to be in disarray.

And it’s not just the presidential race that Republicans have to worry about. Arizona represents one of the GOP’s best Senate pickup opportunities, with Democrat turned independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema facing a challenge from progressive Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego.

Yet the Arizona GOP, which is now seen as one of the most right-wing state parties in the nation, might not be up to winning either the Senate or the presidential contest. And it’s not just Arizona: A number of GOP state affiliates look increasingly troubled as 2024 looms.

Arizona GOP spent big to overturn the 2020 election

Conservative journalist Jon Gabriel highlighted the problem in a recent Arizona Republic op-ed, noting that the party had less than $50,000 in its cash reserves as of March 31, down more than $700,000 from the same point on the calendar four years earlier. Gabriel noted that $300,000 of that difference was spent on “legal consulting” as part of the effort to overturn the 2020 presidential result and declare Donald Trump the victor.

The state’s populous Maricopa County was the center of the baseless conspiracy theory that the election had been stolen from Trump, with Republicans feuding over a partisan “audit” meant to find evidence that Democrats had cheated to win. The report commissioned by a little-known group called the Cyber Ninjas found that Joe Biden had indeed won in the state, something the Republican chairman of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors had been saying for months.

“That should be the end of the story,” Jack Sellers said in a September 2021 statement. “Everything else is just noise. But I’m sure it won’t be. Board members told the truth in the face of angry phone calls and emails fueled by a coordinated campaign to shake Americans’ faith in the power of their vote. Will they accept the truth now?”

While Republicans in Arizona were focused on overturning the 2020 election, they lost numerous races in 2022. Democrats reclaimed the governor’s mansion for the first time in over a decade and retained a Senate seat after the GOP nominated former TV news anchor and conspiracy theorist Kari Lake to run for governor and controversial venture capitalist Blake Masters for the Senate.

Lake is now mulling a bid for Sinema’s Senate seat, saying recently that she believed she’s the only Republican who can win the race.

A consolidation of Democratic power in Michigan

Trump won Michigan in 2016, shocking Democrats who believed it to be part of their unbreachable Midwest fire wall. Four years later, Republicans believed they had the opportunity to flip a Senate seat there and came within 2 points of doing so.

Those gains quickly receded by the 2022 midterms: Republicans were blown out in what was seen as a winnable gubernatorial race and lost control of the state Senate for the first time in nearly 40 years.

Things haven’t improved much since then. On July 8, a brawl broke out at a meeting of the state GOP committee, with Clare County Republican Party Chair Mark DeYoung telling the Detroit News in an emergency room interview that a fellow Republican “kicked me in my balls as soon as I opened the door.”

“We’re so divided,” he added. “I just wish we could come together.”

No charges have been filed, but the case has been referred to the county prosecutor.

However, on Tuesday afternoon, state Attorney General Dana Nessel — a Democrat who also won reelection in 2022 — announced that 16 state Republicans were being charged for signing a certificate falsely stating that Trump won the 2020 election there. Among those facing eight felony counts is former Michigan Republican Party co-chairwoman Meshawn Maddock.

According to a June report from the Washington Post, at least four county Republican parties in Michigan are immersed in disputes over who their rightful leaders are. The conflicts between far-right and more moderate Michigan Republicans has also proved costly: The party had only $116,000 on hand as of March 31, down from nearly $867,000 two years prior.

With Democratic Sen. Debbie Stabenow retiring next year, Republicans will have an opportunity to flip an open Senate seat — but the race is already rated by the nonpartisan Cook Political Report as leaning toward a Democratic win.

Trouble elsewhere

Liberal outlet Daily Kos highlighted this week that the trouble extends beyond Arizona and Michigan. In Colorado, where Republicans won a Senate seat as recently as 2014, it’s unclear whether the state GOP is actually paying any staff members or is running solely on volunteers. Colorado was once considered a purple state, but Biden won it by 14 points in 2020.

Trump came within 2 points of winning Minnesota in 2016, but the Republican Party is also in trouble there. According to a June filing, the party had just $53 on hand and more than $335,000 in debts. Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar is up for reelection in 2024, but so far no major GOP candidate has announced a bid against her.