Michigan GOP Leader Admits They Are Half Million in Debt and That Is the Good News

(AP Photo)

I know I told some people that I would give the Michigan GOP new leadership about 6 months to find out where the bathrooms were at the GOP HQ in Lansing. However, in my article yesterday where I talk about the GOP head honcho Kristina Karamo deciding to abandon the HQ (Did the Michigan GOP Just Concede the 2024 POTUS Race With Its Latest Move?) I feel it is safe to move on from waiting any longer and declare how to prepare for 2025.

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The party is on fire and no one knows where the fire hose is or even if calling 9-1-1 is an option because there may be some sort of fraud involved in making the call.

Everything is about fraud.

As I mentioned yesterday in my article about the disastrous decision of abandoning the GOP headquarters, the reason behind this is simple: Lack of money.

Now I know some who have reached out to me want to make this seem that this is a brilliant stroke of genius and that abandoning a building that cost just over $100,000 a year to rent is just good, sound economics… Except for that whole thing about you needing a base of operations in the state to coordinate all statewide activities particularly when you’re about 18 months away from a presidential election.

Thankfully they got that post office box in Grand Rapids cheap, am I right!?!?!!?

Seems that the party is broke to the tune of almost half a million and has no idea how to pay that off and more importantly raise money during the most important cycle in Michigan’s history.

From the Detroit News

“The party is in debt. $460,000,” Karamo said during the Muskegon County event.

“So that is something we’re working through,” she added. “But we do have funding to get started and get our initial operations going. Hopefully, the former chair will be gracious enough to pay that off.”

The former chairman, Ron Weiser, a wealthy real estate businessman from Ann Arbor, decided not to seek another term this year.

The party’s overall debt can be hard to nail down because it has multiple accounts, some that have to be reported publicly and others that don’t.

Asked about the $460,000 in alleged debt, Weiser didn’t refute the number in a Friday statement. But he also gave no indication he would step in to resolve it.

Weiser said he had given more than $5 million to help Republicans win elections for the 2022 cycle. Like other party organizations, there was “a relatively small amount of debt left over that represents less than 4% of total revenues,” Weiser said.

“Given the small percentage involved, I am confident the new administration will be able to utilize the fundraising plan she campaigned on to raise the funds to pay down the line of credit and make Michigan Republicans competitive in 2024,” he added.

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So to help out those who have criticized me for being too snarky or say that I just am complaining and I’m not offering any solutions let me be clear:

Almost every Michigan GOP chair that has come in has dealt with a deficit from a previous election cycle. They use the contacts that they had built up over the years of party activism, they hold fundraisers and they make promises to people that sometimes they shouldn’t make. Yet the debt gets cleared up and then they build the apparatus for the next election cycle.

This time, however, the current GOP chair – who was rightfully critical of the previous team’s efforts – is taking a tin cup in hand and asking for the billionaire Ron Weiser to pay off the debt. I don’t know, maybe you should have thought that one out while you were going YARD on the establishment calling everybody a “RINO” and saying that people who opposed you might be demonic.

Style points can go a long way.

There is a lot to criticize Ron Weiser and Trump super fan Meeshawn Maddock for, like the way they ran the Michigan GOP the previous two years. However, you never burn a bridge in politics unless you absolutely know for certain you’re not going to cross it in the future.

Karamo just spewed talking points and the delegates ate it up and now you are broke and the people with money are probably not answering the phones right about now.

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So how will they retire this debt and raise oodles of money for the future?

I have some thoughts.

People like M. Moore who have reached out to me and called me very bad names for pointing out the clown show that is occurring in the Michigan GOP could make some max donations to bail out the GOP. I fully admit that this debt is not Karamos’s doing but she ran for the job so now it is her responsibility. All those that believe she is the right person for the job can donate right here and back up your belief with cold hard cash.

How about calling Donald Trump and asking him to bail you out? Whoever is the GOP nominee would probably like to be competitive in Michigan, even though it is a deep blue state. Let’s see how much confidence Donald has in the team up here being Karamo is all about Trump.

Karano and her staff could just forego a salary or take a pay cut until they get that previous debt paid off and lead by example. Show the rank and file how it is done.

See, I’m full of solutions.

However, I’m also full of something a lot of emotional balls of political yarn lack here and that is common sense. Karamo had zero experience in running anything, her disastrous run as Secretary of State and loss by over 600,000 votes should have given you folks a clue that maybe she was not up to the task.

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If you want to say that is mean or uncalled for I don’t really care. The Republicans in this state just got their rear ends handed to them four months ago and the future looks pretty dim. This was not the time to hand the keys over to someone who claimed fraud and never provided a scintilla of proof of that and now the Democrats will control this state for the next decade because of this.

So let’s say how fast that debt gets taken care of or how long before the Michigan GOP just gives up the ghost and we bring back the Whig Party.

My money is on the Whigs making a comeback first.


HEY, if you have thoughts on any of this, you can always let me know by checking out my bio RIGHT HERE and let me know via email to social media platforms. If you get really creative, I may mention you on my radio show or Facebook live events that I do LIVE three times a week.

The opinions expressed by contributors are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of RedState.com.

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