Republican Party of Texas

We are very fortunate to have Greg Abbott as the top of our ticket and Commissioner Craddick as the head of our Victory efforts as they are proving to be an effective one-two punch to the Democrats’ efforts to turn the state blue. This is my third election cycle as Chairman and the cooperation and assistance the RPT has received from the Abbott campaign is unprecedented. In addition to General Abbott assisting the party with raising money so that we have vigorous Victory effort, his team is also genuinely concerned with helping out the rest of the ticket. They have made it clear they want the RPT and the Victory Committee to have the resources we need to get out the vote and promote straight party ticket voting so that we can maintain majorities in the State House and Senate.

General Abbott pledged to me that if I ran for reelection he would raise the party a minimum of $1 million for our efforts and true to his word, he has already exceeded this amount. Speaking of Victory, I have been fortunate to have Comptroller Susan Combs as our chairman in 2010 and Judge Ed Emmett in 2012. For the 2014 cycle we have once again been able to recruit a top notch Victory Chair in Commissioner Christi Craddick. In August, Commissioner Craddick ramped up Victory efforts during the first week of the month when she hosted a business roundtable for major Victory donors in Houston with special guest, Senator Ted Cruz. That was then followed by a fundraising luncheon for Victory later that day once again headlined by Senator Cruz. That evening, Senator Cruz was the featured guest at a special, invitation only, Grassroots Club event. I am very appreciative that Commissioner Craddick hosted two events and Senator Cruz took the time to speak at three RPT events in one day. They both went above and beyond the call of duty. The very next week Commissioner Craddick hosted a fundraiser in San Antonio. The featured guests wereSenator John Cornyn and the Speaker of the House, Joe Straus.

While Commissioner Craddick was busy raising money for Victory, the Victory staff was organizing Super Saturday block walks and phone banks. In actuality, we have staff and volunteers walking and calling virtually every day somewhere in the state. However, on Super Saturdays we have a more concentrated effort to cover a large territory and make tens of thousands of calls and knock on tens of thousands of doors in one day. On Saturday, August 9th the Victory staff had a block walk in cooperation with our candidates, especially General Abbott’s team. Then the following weekend we had a Super Saturday phone bank. In between Super Saturdays our Victory staff held strategy sessions and hosted a briefing for representatives of candidates running for election this fall.

The Victory Committee also undertook a massive effort in August to reach out to each and every Republican who moved into the state recently and/or moved from one county to another. The team has also prepared an extensive program to reach out to our over-65 Republicans. This is a large undertaking as there are over one million identified Republicans over the age of 65. Because of Commissioner Craddick’s outstanding efforts, the Victory Committee already has resources to complete this task in the near future.

Even though we were all busy with Victory functions throughout August, I was still able to attend to my regular business as Chairman including attending the RNC meetings in Chicago the second week of the month. Our Committeeman, Dr. Robin Armstrong, and Committeewoman, Toni Anne Dashiell, both also attended the entire week of meetings. Significantly, the committee elected members to a new Debate Commission which will wrest control of the debate process from the media. Specifically, there will be a series of sanctioned RNC debates, most likely eight in total. If a candidate participates in a non-sanctioned debate they will lose their right to participate in the RNC sanctioned debates and there is a possibility that additional sanctions such as reducing their delegate allocation could also be imposed. The RNC is committed to not allowing overly biased moderators to run Republican primary debates, such as George Stephanopoulos, a former Clinton operative. The committee also formally voted to award Cleveland the host city for the national convention in 2016. The convention will be held either the week of June 27th or July 18th.

Following the RNC meetings I was a guest on the Faith and Liberty radio show hosted by Dave Garrisonwho was previously a candidate for Congress. Later in the week I had an extensive sit down interview with Greenwire Media regarding the state of the RPT. The following day I attended the Texas Alliance for Lifeluncheon and spoke at the Texas House Republican Caucus Legislative Retreat held at Barton Creek. I ended the week by attending and speaking at our day-long county chair and SREC training held in Austin. I was really pleased that we had a great turnout of approximately 200 party leaders. Everyone seemed enthusiastic and fired up about the fast approaching Election Day. Click here to read the full recap of the training.

The following week I headed to New Braunfels to speak to the local Republican Women’s Club. They generously donated $1,000 to the RPT, for which we thank them. From there it was back to Austin for several staff meetings to review progress on Victory preparations and to obtain an assessment of the state of races around the state. Then it was on to Houston to attend an RNC fundraising luncheon at whichChairman Reince Priebus spoke. Committeeman Dr. Robin Armstrong was in attendance as well as former RPT Chairman, George Strake.

Following that luncheon, I had a chance to visit with Chairman Priebus about continuing the RNC/RPT/Victory Committee partnership in Texas beyond the November election. It was one of my goals when I ran for Chairman to establish a statewide year-round Victory operation that will not conclude when the election is over. The RNC has been instrumental in providing us substantial, ongoing financial resources, to undertake not only engagement efforts but to open offices earlier and hire more staff than previous cycles. I shared my vision with Chairman Priebus that I would like to keep as many, if not all, of the offices open through the 2016 election cycle. It is my hope that if Victory can raise enough money to fully fund our get-out-the-vote efforts while leaving some money in the Victory account at the end of this election, that we will be able to accomplish this goal with the help of future money from the RNC.

I anticipate that Chairman Priebus is planning to substantially cut back on RNC expenditures after November, so it will take a combined effort of all three entities to accomplish this. Chairman Priebus committed to providing some resources to continue the program, and Commissioner Craddick is fully supportive of trying to raise enough money to fully fund our GOTV efforts and leave a surplus in the Victory account. Chairman Priebus instructed us to create a proposal pertaining to continuing the Victory effort through 2016. My Executive Director, Beth Cubriel, put together the proposal and submitted it to the RNC. Beth and I had an opportunity to discuss this with Chairman Priebus and his Chief of Staff, Mike Shields, and they indicated they were generally in favor of the structure of the program. However, after receiving their input as to changes and cost savings they wish to achieve, Beth went back to work and resubmitted three different plans at varying cost levels. I am optimistic that we can reach an agreement that will allow us to maintain a significant statewide Victory presence as long as we continue to raise money at current levels, and we are successful at putting aside some of the current money for the future. If this is achieved it will be the first time in recent memory, if not ever, that the RPT has a permanent voter identification and engagement effort infrastructure in place. At this time I am optimistic that we will be able to carry forward some, if not most, of our Victory operations into 2015.

After I visited with Chairman Priebus in Houston, I returned to Austin, and from there went on to Collin County where Chairman George Flint invited me to speak at the opening of the Collin County Victory Center. Former SREC member Neal Katz is the new Executive Director for Collin County. Senator Ken Paxton, Representative Scott Turner, Representative Jodie Laubenburg, Representative Angie Chen-Button, and Congressman Sam Johnson all spoke at the event. The center was packed with volunteers from around the Collin County area.

I then went to Copperas Cove to attend the Coryell County Republican Party annual fish fry. The hall where the event was held was packed and the fish was particularly good. It was then back to Austin where I met with the new Director General from Taiwan along with his chief aid. Upon the conclusion of that meeting I drove to Belton to speak at the Bell County annual fundraiser dinner. County Chair, Nancy Boston, once again had a packed house and raised a lot of money from her auction. State Senator Troy Fraser was there as was candidate for State Representative, Molly White. I also had the opportunity to sit next toCongressman John Carter. I was very impressed that Congressman Carter makes it a point to come home every week to visit his district and prides himself as a lifelong Texan. The following day, I had an opportunity to visit with former Bexar County Chairman and SREC member, Curt Nelson. I then took the short trip over to the Capitol to see Senator Brandon Creighton sworn into his new position from SD-4. I ended the month by speaking at a forum sponsored by the Conservative Coalition in Cleveland, Texas.

On the financial front we continued to pay all bills to $0 and we maintained over $1.7 million in all of our accounts. However, our overall balances are beginning to decline significantly as we start to spend more money in support of our candidates. For example, we cut checks totaling approximately $100,000 from the Candidate Resource Committee to assist local candidates across the state. CRC Chairman Jane Cansino should be commendend for her hard work in raising money for the committee. The Victory Committee also spent a significant amount of money on mail and phones. As the weeks go by, I anticipate we will make the decision as to whether we have enough money remaining in our account to provide support for more candidates. Fortunately, we still have a solid bank account. I am optimistic that we will be able to fully fund the Victory effort and still leave a little for 2015, provide some financial assistance to our candidates, and still be on track to have at least a half million dollars on hand at the end of the year.

Believe it or not the voting process actually begins this week. This Friday, voters over 65 and members of the military can ask for mail-in ballots. We are less than two months away from early voting in person and the election itself is barely over two months away. The bottom line is we are not at the end of the campaign, but we are at the beginning of the end of the campaign. It is my hope that with your help and everyone working together, we are also at the beginning of the end of the Democrats’ threat to turn Texas blue this fall.

Stephen Munisteri, Chairman