Ex-GOP congressman blasts 'feckless' RNC for refusing to amend its Trump loyalty pledge

16 June 2023

The Republican National Committee on Thursday rejected ex-Arkansas governor and 2024 presidential contender Asa Hutchinson's request to amend its demand that candidates sign a pledge to support the GOP nominee if they want to participate in primary debates.

RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel announced in April 2022 that the party was withdrawing from the Commission on Presidential Debates, which led to allegations that it was tipping the scales in favor of its frontrunner, twice-indicted former President Donald Trump, who repeatedly whined of unfair treatment in the 2016 and 2020 contests.

Hutchinson told Politico in a Wednesday interview that "I'm not going to vote for him if he's a convicted felon" and that "I'm not going to vote for him if he's convicted of espionage, and I'm not going to vote for him if he's (convicted of) other serious crimes. And I'm not going to support him." Hutchison added that "they need to put a little rationality to what is said in that oath or that pledge."

According to Politico, RNC officials delivered their response during a "contentious" Thursday phone call with Hutchinson. The outlet also noted that the RNC "has made Trump's legal woes the subject of some of its recent fundraising appeals, though the committee has sent fewer indictment-themed emails and texts since Trump's federal case last week compared to when he faced New York state charges earlier this year around alleged hush money payments to a porn star."

MSNBC panelists on Friday's edition of Deadline: White House blasted the RNC's decision.

Host Nicolle Wallace remarked to political analyst David Jolly that "it's almost easier to explain this way, right, than if they said, 'Well, all right, now that he is been criminally charged, you know, we say tomato, you say tomato,' it, it makes perfect sense that the RNC's position is, 'You will stand by him even as slash if the ship goes down.'"

Jolly wholeheartedly agreed and shamed the RNC for betting all of its cards on embattled Trump.

"Yeah, Nicolle, just a humiliating moment for the Republican National Committee kind of demonstrating the difference between a cult and a political organization requiring this absolute fealty, and understand we're skipping past the fact that he's now been found civilly liable for sexual assault. That apparently wasn't even a threshold question for this pledge," Jolly replied.

"The question of whether or not he has mishandled the nation's secrets is a threshold question, and the RNC batted it down and said, 'We don't care. You have to support our guy,'" the retired Florida Republican congressman continued. "Now the interesting thing, the second reason it's humiliating, Nicolle, is I'm not sure the candidates themselves are, actually, actually care. Chris Christie said, I'll sign it even though I'll never support Donald Trump and I'll treat this piece of paper the same way Donald Trump treated it eight years ago, which is to ignore it. Donald Trump himself probably won't agree to this. So, you know, the RNC — a really feckless organization at this point — even those who will go along with the RNC are already saying, 'But I don't really mean it.' But at the end of the day, let the whole world know. Let everybody know that the Republican National Committee said, 'If you are going to run for president, that means you must support a felon who was found civilly liable for sexual assault. If that's our nominee, we're expecting you to stick with him.'"

Watch the clip below or at this link.

Politico's full report continues here.

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