A quiet revolt is brewing inside the Republican National Committee, and its target is the chairman President Trump personally chose to lead it.
Some committee members are demanding a forensic audit of spending decisions, including hair and makeup services for the President and other officials. They are also questioning the hiring of the daughter of President Trump's former chief of staff.
Feuding Republicans are leaking emails and opposition research on rival factions. The White House, meanwhile, is threatening to cut off fundraising help if the rebels refuse to fall in line.
The fight will help shape the 2028 presidential nominating contest and represents a rare challenge to the President's dominance of the party. It comes even after Republicans suffered their worst midterm performance in a generation, while leaders across Washington have shown little appetite for moving past him.
Inside the RNC, an organization of 168 members elected from every state, a small but growing group is backing an effort to depose Chairman Joe Gruters. The President wants to keep him in charge.
The dissidents are rallying behind Kentucky's KC Crosbie, the committee's second-in-command. She launched her bid just two days after the election in a letter that enraged both the White House and Gruters' allies.
Crosbie remains a vocal supporter of the President and his "Make America Great Again" agenda. Her opponents nonetheless view her bid as a direct challenge to his power.
RNC member Oscar Brock of Tennessee, who supports Crosbie, made the case for change. "We have an obligation to serve the Republican Party the most effective way we can. And if all we do is say yes to what the White House wants, I'm not sure that's doing what's best for the Republican Party," he said.
"Our job is to elect Republicans broadly, not to support one man all the time," Brock continued. He said that mission requires new leadership. "There's so much frustration that Chairman Gruters didn't pull his weight in this election, that the RNC was far less effective than it should have been," he said.
In her letter, Crosbie called the midterms "a serious setback" and urged the RNC to provide "an honest account" of what went wrong. "We should preserve what we built and be equally willing to confront where we fell short," she wrote.
Crosbie declined to be interviewed. The leadership election will be held in January at the RNC's winter meeting in Arizona.
It is unclear how many members will back her, though the number so far is believed to be small. Some would-be supporters privately worry about a White House backlash, especially with Stephen Miller taking over as the President's chief of staff, while others believe presidents should pick their own party chairs.
Gruters has vocal backers of his own. Lauren LePage, an RNC member from Maine, praised his help for her father, Paul LePage, who flipped a congressional seat in a rare bright spot for Republicans this cycle.
She called Gruters "highly responsive" during the campaign and praised his "record-setting fundraising." "From my perspective, as chairman, he did his job," she said, adding that the President's endorsement is "something that the committee should take very seriously."
Nevada Republican Party Chairman Michael McDonald called Crosbie a "dear friend" but said the President is "the leader of our party" and "you always have to fall in line with the leader." "I don't have a bad word to say about KC at all. It's just that the president wants to go with Joe Gruters," McDonald said.
"The president made his choice," he added. For now, Crosbie's supporters are believed to be a small minority.
Crosbie's backers insist a leadership change is needed to show that the party will do things differently after losses even in conservative strongholds such as Texas, South Carolina and Mississippi. Patti Lyman, an RNC member from Virginia, said it would be "catastrophic" and "insulting" to the base "to keep the same leadership and pretend that we don't need to do anything different, that we don't need new players and a new plan."
Lyman described Crosbie as "by far the best candidate currently running to lead the RNC forward to victory in 2028." Sue Cienki, a committee member from Rhode Island, predicted Crosbie would win support from at least two members in 10 states, the minimum of 20 needed for a successful nomination.
Cienki insisted she would not be scared off by pressure from the White House, which has been actively lobbying members. "We should not be influenced by any one person or other. It's our organization," she said.
"We have to hold an election, not a selection," Cienki added. The White House, however, has made its displeasure plain.
The President and senior aides were furious about Crosbie's letter and the lack of any advance warning. At a White House meeting the following day, the President threatened to punish the RNC if members crossed him, according to a senior official with direct knowledge of the gathering who spoke on condition of anonymity.
He said he would refuse to help the committee, including by skipping fundraisers and barring the use of his name and image in mail and digital solicitations. Such a move would be devastating, because he remains the party's most effective fundraiser.
An Axios story that first reported the threats was texted to all 168 RNC members. The same official said staff persuaded the President not to go after Crosbie personally.
Instead, he posted a lengthy statement on Truth Social hailing Gruters as a "MAGA Warrior" and giving him his "Complete and Total Endorsement." The White House referred questions about the fight to that post.
The Constitution bars the President from seeking a third term, but he is expected to play a central role in choosing the party's next nominee. His team contends he remains the most popular Republican in the country, and House Republicans this week elected a slate of new leaders closely aligned with him.
The stakes are high because the RNC will oversee the presidential primary process. That includes setting the nominating calendar, the debate schedule, the national convention and the rules for selecting the nominee.
People close to Gruters, speaking anonymously, called Crosbie's campaign "100% a challenge" to the President's power and described the RNC as "the president's political operation." They argued that a leadership change now would leave the committee badly behind heading into the next presidential cycle.
They also rejected Crosbie's call for a postelection review, saying it would do little more than rehash grievances on paper. Similar demands for a retrospective became a headache for Democratic National Committee Chairman Ken Martin after the President won in 2024.
Gruters' allies said he has taken the criticism seriously and has been soliciting feedback ahead of 2028. He spent much of this week on private calls with members, who said he listened to their grievances but said little about what he would change.
According to nearly a half-dozen Crosbie supporters, the opposition has little to do with the President's leadership or policies. Instead, they are focused on the RNC's spending under Gruters, noting that Republicans enjoyed a massive fundraising advantage and still lost the House and Senate.
"There's clearly a groundswell of support for a forensic audit," Brock said. In a letter to members obtained by The Associated Press, Gruters acknowledged the concerns.
He defended a $22,500 expenditure on hospitality space at the Presidents Cup golf event, saying it was offered to major donors and "resulted in $2.5 million in renewed contributions to the RNC." He also addressed "a brief contract" with Caroline Wiles, a longtime Republican consultant and daughter of Susie Wiles, noting she was hired by his predecessor, Michael Whatley.
"While I have no reason to doubt Caroline Wiles's value to the RNC or Chairman Whatley's reasons for bringing her on, this was a brief six-month engagement that ended when I was elected Chairman," Gruters wrote. He also defended paying for "hair and make-up services" for senior officials, including the President, Vice President JD Vance and former press secretary Karoline Leavitt.
"This was a request made of us so that the expense did not fall to taxpayers," Gruters wrote. He said the officials "generously gave so much of their limited time and energies to help the RNC this cycle" and "did not ask for much of us in return, so we felt this was a request we could accommodate."
Gruters promised members "honest and direct answers to concerns raised" as the conversations continue. "I pledge to listen and learn from you about what happened in the field," he wrote, "so together we can move forward stronger than ever."
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