After the CCR Election: Some CRs Want The Drama to Continue
I had the pleasure of attending the California College Republican convention this weekend. It was organized to a “T,” by Convention Director Michael Antonopoulos and was a great chance for CRs from across the state to meet, interact, and obviously party. We heard speeches from Steve Poizner, Meg Whitman, Ron Nehring, Tom Del Beccaro, Shawn and Michelle Steel, David Horowitz, John Yoo, Greg Gutfeld, and although this list is long, many more fantastic speakers. There were training sessions, parties, an anti-Tax rally, and a run-in with Bay Area anti-war nut-jobs. After all the fun it’s disappointing that I’ll have to write about the good stuff tomorrow, tonight I’m writing about CR drama that for some reason still continues after the election.
Michael Antonopoulos of Saint Mary’s College won the California College Republican election with a landslide vote of 416 to 18 against Adam Ellison of University of the Pacific. All of Antonopoulos’ Revolutionize CCR slate was elected, while Ellison’s Red State Rising slate failed to win a significant number of votes for any single position. The drama and infighting in CCR built up until the convention, which ended today. Apparently some CRs, on the losing side, still can’t get over the loss.
Adam Brickley, who’s not a College Republican and has been covering the infighting with a one-sided and deeply angry perspective on his blog “The Brickyard”, posted some news today that is both misinformed and misleading.
Election rules state that only registered delegates have a voice on the voting floor, because of this, “UCSD College Republicans” and “UCLA College Republicans” and “UC Berkeley College Republicans” were not allowed on the floor and sat in the viewing gallery at the back of the room. During the time allotted for motions and business, Marshall Roe from Pasadena City College, who received an extension himself to complete his chartering documents at the Friday night Ex-Comm meeting, motioned to charter UCLA. The UCLA CRs had more than 30 days to submit chartering documents, and three extensions were allowed for all CCR chapters; UCLA failed to submit their documentation by the Friday night deadline, arriving two hours late. The Chairwoman called for a voice-vote on UCLA’s chartering and it was defeated. Video will show that the “nays” definitively won the vote. The entire UCLA chapter walked out of the room, along with the UC Irvine College Republicans. Adam Ellison attempted to motion for a roll call vote, but UCLA had already stormed out of the room and a motion never made it to the floor.
Roe then moved to charter the “UCSD College Republicans,” who did submit documentation but were not chartered following a 6-1 Ex-Comm vote in favor of the “Triton College Republicans” last month. Again a voice vote was held and chartering was resoundingly denied by a majority of the delegates. CRs agreed UCSD was not disenfranchised, they were never franchised, Triton CRs was. This again prompted a walk-out of almost all of the delegates that supported the non-chartered chapters.
UC Irvine and Saddleback College voluntarily withdrew their charters, disenfranchising themselves.
The vote tallies leave the disgruntled chapters with little defense; their criticisms sound serious, but are unjustified, what is more fair than a vote of the entire state organization? UCSD CRs claim to have been “disenfranchised” or “overthrown” by the “corrupt establishment,” however, all of UCSD could have voted if they had resolved their internal problems, instead they decided to embarrass themselves and the entire organization. Either way, their votes would have had no significant effect on the outcome of the election; this fact leaves them with little more than a conspiracy theory. CRs is about a bigger picture, a cause that involves millions of Americans, it’s just not all about you.
College Republicans know about and are involved electoral politics–when the votes come in, the winner wins and the loser loses–that’s it; grievance mongering only damages the reputation of the organization. It’s time to move on.
Note: Brickley discusses the alleged withdrawal of $500 from the UCSD CRs bank account, an issue that I have not covered on this blog; it’s troubling, but, it’s being dealt with by the parties involved and I hope they’ll come to a satisfactory agreement.
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New post #tcot: After the CCR Election: Some CRs Want The Drama to Continue: I had the pleasure o.. http://tinyurl.com/c36sl5
If everything you say is trueabout Revolutionize having the election locked up, which I don’t dispute, then it is even worse that you didn’t even allow us to make our case. Silencing the opposition is what the left is supposed to be good at. I was assured before the vote by several ExComm members that I would be allowed to put forward a motion and to speak. Perhaps you couldn’t allow us to speak because there is NO REASONABLE ARGUMENT against the legitimacy of College Republicans at UCSD. No matter which side’s “facts” you believe, our club retains Constitutional legitimacy. This is not about RSR or any election, this is about silencing the opposition to cover your own reputation.
http://gop.ucsd.edu/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&id=18:constitutional-legitimacy-by-inez-feltscher&Itemid=20&layout=default
The vote tallies leave the disgruntled chapters with little defense; their criticisms sound serious, but are unjustified, what is more fair than a vote of the entire state organization?
An informed vote of the entire state organization?
As Inez points out, Revolutionize CCR’s dishonor (in refusing to even let her speak, after promising otherwise!) is inexcusable precisely because they had the election locked up. If they didn’t, it could at least be defended as politics as usual, even if it still, in isolation, would unambiguously have been wrong. (Don’t agree? Then present a counter to UCSD Argument #4 under the link Inez provided.) But since they would have won regardless, they’ve proven they’re currently incapable of taking even a trivial political risk to do the right thing.
You are, of course, entitled to your opinion about our criticisms being “serious, but… unjustified”, and as the proprietor of this blog you have every right to voice said opinion on your front page. As a Republican in 2009, however, I imagine you see yourself as someone who prefers to support the competent and right side over the wrong and currently more powerful side in a conflict. It may not be clear to you now (even privately) whether or not the UCSD situation fits this description. But I suspect it will become more clear in the future, and when it does, you may want to think about what you’re trying to do with your blogging and reevaluate your expressed opinion.
Chris, what I don’t get about your “logical argument” is why you think the actions would have been defensible if they had in fact been done in order to secure votes–that, to me, seems like it would have been corruption. Instead, the election results show clearly that CCR’s actions at UCSD were not intended to underhandedly secure votes for RevCCR, but were taken because CCR thought them to be right.
I was there, I don’t remember Inez asking to speak, only Marshall speaking on behalf of UCSD (since he was actually a delegate), and don’t know of any promise having been made to her.
What political risk are you talking about? It wouldn’t have been a risk for Revolutionize, and anyway, it wasn’t their call it was CCR’s. Every delegate was given a chance to vote on CCR’s decision and Inez’s club lost. What was uninformed about the vote? Don’t belittle CRs by saying they didn’t know what they were voting on.
It’s over.
Alan, see this comment I made at CR Nation.
When you think an action is right, you are capable of explaining why. Especially when given three weeks to do so. “It is right because I say it is” is not an explanation, particularly when there’s a plausible conflict of interest. Something that actually countered UCSD Argument #4 would have been.
I was told before the vote that I would be allowed to speak. Marshall had to instead because we were cordoned off in the back and not recognized to speak. Alvaro was not allowed to speak even when Marshall yielded his time to UCLA, so I didn’t even bother.
And I do challenge the assumption that people knew what they were voting on, because there hasn’t been a single counter to my constitutional arguments. There isn’t one that I can think of, but no one has even attempted to give me an argument to counter mine, and instead I wasn’t allowed to give mine to the delegates.
Inez, sorry that I didn’t correct my last comment earlier. I checked it out and found that you were told that you could speak if a motion was made for you to explain your case on the floor, I don’t know if that would have gone through or not had it been you instead of Alvaro, who’s school was not in the same position as yours, but Marshall was given the opportunity and we can’t go back in time.
I don’t think it’s just an assumption that the delegates knew what they were voting on, anyone on the floor who was unsure could have asked for an explanation of the situation, and did not. From that, I’m inferring that they did not need the explanation, meaning that they were informed. As for your constitutional arguments, since the convention is already over, I don’t know how useful they are except for in their use in your continuing struggle to bring the CRs at UCSD to a satisfactory agreement on how you will continue, either together or appart.
It’s late to re-hash all of these arguments that no longer hold any actionable relevance, as far as I can see. It’s really time for everyone who still feels harmed, victimized or left out to find a way to work with the rest of CCR as we all move forward.
It’s late to re-hash all of these arguments that no longer hold any actionable relevance, as far as I can see. It’s really time for everyone who still feels harmed, victimized or left out to find a way to work with the rest of CCR as we all move forward.
I agree with this. As long as we don’t see “Triton College Republicans” try more party-damaging stunts like tabling near us on Admit Day and driving away lots of conservatives who don’t want to get involved in infighting, you’re right about the lack of actionable relevance. (I am perfectly fine with them continuing to exist and competing with us. As Republicans, we should all know that many types of competition are very healthy. But their lack of a response to our constitutional arguments means that, in isolated cases like Admit Day where competition is not in the party’s interest, they yield to us. Period. If this arrangement is unacceptable to them, our arguments still have actionable relevance.)
I will grant that, as wronged as we feel, far, far worse things have happened in American politics. The 1876 presidential election comes to mind. Life went on then. Samuel Tilden remained loyal to the United States. Life will also go on now. And we will remain loyal to the Republican Party.
Just read Wikipedia’s article on the 1876 election, and it implies that, unlike what I thought I remembered, Tilden wasn’t really wronged, to the degree disenfranchisement was occurring his side was more responsible. So, that was a bad example for me to pick.
Anyway, here’s to hoping that CCR quietly accepts our arguments and stops Megan from picking more self-destructive fights.
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