'I’m still legally the chair': Ousted MI GOP leader refusing to stop spending party’s money

Even though the Republican National Committee has recognized former Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-Michigan) as the rightful head of the Michigan Republican Party (MIGOP), former MIGOP chair Kristina Karamo is continuing to function as if she is in charge — including over its finances.

In addition to the RNC, former President Donald Trump has also recognized Hoekstra as the head of the MIGOP, and Hoekstra has been conducting meetings as party chairman. However, the Detroit News reported Tuesday that Karamo is still swiping the Mitten State GOP's credit card despite disgruntled Republicans' 40-5 vote on January 6 of this year to remove her from her position. Karamo — who called her own meeting of 60 Republican officials who voted 59-1 to keep her as chair, has said the January 6 vote was illegal, and has disregarded its results. Now, Hoekstra's organization is asking the court to intervene and officially recognize him as the chairman of the MIGOP.

"I'm still legally the chair," Karamo said last week. "The majority of the [Michigan Republican Party's state] committee stands with me."

READ MORE: 'Put an end to the chaos': GOP leaders in swing state say party is 'on the verge of imploding'

Karamo — an election denier who ran a failed campaign for secretary of state in 2022 — was elected to lead the MIGOP in February of 2023 after Republicans lost all statewide offices the previous November, and after Michigan flipped from Republican to Democrat in the 2020 presidential election. Karamo maintained she inherited a bleak financial situation from her predecessor and has been unable to dig the party out of its hole due to decisions made before she was elected.

However, the party's finances have continued to worsen, with Karamo now looking to sell the party's headquarters in Lansing to help bring the financially destitute organization back from the brink of ruin. An attorney for Comerica Bank has already served the MIGOP with a default notice after making no payments on a loan in excess of half a million dollars, and the party is in a desperate cash crunch as it gears up for what may be the most expensive presidential election in history in a must-win swing state.

Donald Campbell — an attorney representing Karamo — dismissed Hoekstra's attempt to have the courts recognize their client's ouster by calling it an "intra-party political dispute" that should be resolved privately between the feuding parties.

"Families sometimes don't get along," Campbell told the Detroit News. "But they're still family. And that's what we look at this dispute as."

READ MORE: Debt-ridden Michigan GOP seeks to sell headquarters to pay $500K loan currently in default