A collection of GOP County Chairmen and Legislative Chairmen past and present have written a public letter to AZGOP Chairwoman Kelli Ward, detailing their objections to the manner in which she ran the party for the last two years, and asking her to withdraw from her campaign for re-election.
While the open letter thanked Ward for her service, the signers took exception to Ward’s repeated PR blunders, to her open consideration of tearing down the AZGOP and building a new political party in its place, to her misrepresentations regarding the AZGOP’s fundraising, and more than anything else, the losses the party suffered under her leadership.
“In the 2020 election cycle, Arizona failed to secure a win for our President, our Republican-held U.S. Senate seat and a Republican seat on the Corporation Commission. Our nation is now suffering due to our party losing control of the United States Senate by one vote. What has not gone unnoticed at the precinct level is that, for most of us–for the first time in our lifetime, the great State of Arizona will be represented by not one but two Democrat Senators.” wrote the letter’s authors. They also referred to Ward’s messaging as “…not understood” and wrote that “Your egregious distortions of truth are disturbing and duplicitous.”
One member of the State Committee who will be attending the upcoming state meeting said that it was not unusual for there to be some dissent after any chairman’s two-year term, but that some of the specifics of these grievances were very unique. “I can’t recall any GOP Chairman ever publicly musing about crashing their own state party and trying to build a new political party in its place, not to mention doing that while campaigning for re-election? Her voters might wonder if she has any loyalties to the party she wants to lead?” Nevertheless, she had no expectation that Ward would actually withdraw.
Some of the signers included David Eppihimer (immediate past chairman of Pima County), Bill Beard (former chairman of Pima County), Linda Brickman (immediate past chairman of Maricopa County) and John Rhodes (former chairman of Graham County), as well as a number of former and current legislative chairmen from various Maricopa County legislative districts.
The election for Chairman is this Saturday and Ward faces three challengers, including current State Party Treasurer Robert Lettieri, activist Ann Niemann, and Southern Arizona politico and Trump Campaign surrogate Sergio Arellano.