State Central Committee Members

The Chairman led a meeting of the state executive committee where they granted themselves the power to silence dozens of central committee members, an action not expressly allowed by the bylaws, by declaring the meeting to remove him to be illegitimate. No legal counsel was present at that meeting.

Past efforts to silence the SCC include repeated attempts to delegitimize or ignore the votes of members who vote against opting out of open primaries. Regardless of your stance on the open primaries, no organization of liberty-loving people should ever try to erase the votes of elected members.

Denver County Chairman Roger Rowland was an original signatory calling for removal.  In retaliation Chairman Williams removed Roger from the State ExComm. 

National Committeewoman Christy Fidura said, "I have been warned to stay away from this. My county chair here, she has been called ANTIFA....I have had almost no contact with Williams and other GOP officers. I need an Executive Committee that will communicate with me, that will cooperate with me."  

Party Officers Nancy Pallozzi and Todd Watkins have been sued by the State Party.  

Second hand reports indicate that party officers threatened the tax exempt status of the church holding the 7/27 meeting to consider removal.  

Chairman censors dissidents in and outside of the party, including journalists.    

The Colorado GOP official email account touted the state executive committee's decision--which they don't have the power under the bylaws to make--that the 7/27 meeting is illegitimate. That decision stated that the previously scheduled July 19 meeting was no longer necessary, since that meeting was only to satisfy any possible requirement generated by Mr. Watkins's request. The original call  for the July 19 email stated that there would be no business conducted, no members should attend, and that an immediate recess would occur. 

Look carefully at the wording of the not-cancelation of the July 19 meeting (last paragraph of the "decision"). The executive committee "supports the cancelation" of the July 19 meeting, but the state party chose to conduct it anyway after leading people to believe it was no longer going to occur. The meeting was held anyway, under a bridge in Bayfield, and the state party sent out an email touting what a success it was. 

Is this how a functional, professional organization conducts itself? Or is this how people dodge accountability and deflect criticism at all costs? 

Dear SCC Members, 

You’re  all aware by now that a battle is brewing between State Party  leadership and the members of the SCC who have called for a meeting to  remove the Chairman. Many of you may remember that I supported Dave  Williams immediately after he announced his intention to run for chair  and endorsed him at the organizational meeting where he was elected.  Since then, my optimism has faded to concern and now to full opposition.  I serve as the chairman of the Douglas County Republicans, which has  given me a front row seat to witness the growing problems I’ll lay out  for you here. I have come to these positions slowly and with humility  and regret.

The  job of the state party is to grow the party, share our principles,  support Republican candidates, and win elections. Instead, the party has  suffered from a series of decisions that make it clear that the  Chairman does not have the ethics, strategy, or judgment required for  the job.

Ethics.  Leadership  isn’t based on title; it’s based on trust and confidence. Once trust  has been broken, credibility is lost, and followers wander away. When  former state party vice chair Priscilla Rahn decided to run for Douglas  County Commissioner, she was asked to step down from vice chair because  it was a conflict of interest. Unfortunately, Chairman Williams did not  apply the same standard to himself and decided not to step down as State  Party Chair when he ran for Congress. As many now know, Mr. Williams  used money donated for the good of the state party in his own race for  Congress. Furthermore, he used the money pre-primary against another  Republican candidate who didn’t have the same access to a special  postage rate or state party coffers. This is a clear conflict of  interest and abuse of position. These decisions speak directly to  character. 

Strategy. The  decision to change 100 years of pre-primary neutrality has led to  unprecedented intraparty division. Chairman Williams advocated for bylaw  changes that allowed precious state party dollars to be used against  other Republicans ahead of the primaries. Take the CD-8 race. Despite  the fact that Colorado State Rep Gabe Evans went through the assembly  and won 62% of the vote in a three-way race, the state party  inexplicably endorsed another Republican and used limited state party  dollars to attack the assembly winner ahead of the primary. This created  intense discord, depleted resources needed for the general election,  and made it impossible for our primary winners to have any functional  relationship with the state party. The state party endorsed 18  candidates pre-primary and won 4 races, 22%. This is political  malpractice. 

Judgment. The  decision to use the party email address to put a Christ-like figure  with red laser eyes in front of a trans flag and bold lettering that  reads “God hates flags” reduced our Maker and Creator to a political  tool while embarrassing the party.

When  members of the SCC called for a meeting to vote on removal, Mr.  Williams hid behind party officers to dodge the meeting and marshaled  procedural gimmicks to avoid accountability. When that didn’t work, he  sued them. This is defensive, divisive, and dysfunctional.

We need to change.

Since he rode down the escalator in 2015, Donald Trump has assembled a  remarkable coalition of unlikely supporters and rebranded the entire  party.  He walked past the kingmakers and power brokers who  were accustomed to driving candidate selection and policy decisions.  Many were threatened by his new style and aggressively resisted it. Others left the party entirely. 

Today, Trump isn’t just the leader of a political party, he is the leader of a  movement that includes Kid Rock, 50 Cent, Elon Musk, Franklin Graham,  Hulk Hogan, Dana White, Bill Ackman, JD Vance’s mother, union leaders,  UNC frat boys, Joe Rogan, Amber Rose, Log Cabin Republicans, Zionists,  Gold Star Moms, and Moms for Liberty. 

Colorado Republicans can build a coalition of support too.  The  passion of grassroots, coupled with pre-primary neutrality are critical  elements necessary to fuel the enthusiasm needed to win statewide.  It can be done.  Winning is a choice.

I hope you join Todd Watkins, Nancy Pallozzi, and me next Saturday July 27th at the 9:00am meeting in Brighton and vote for removal. 

Respectfully,

Steven Peck