What Happened At The Montco GOP Convention — The below letter was sent by Stan Casacio regarding the meeting of the Montgomery County Republican Committee concerning the election to replace Liz Havey as party chairman.
Dear friends + fighters for real Republican values,
Thank you to my fellow ally Republicans for their patience and their belief in that, although difficult, competition can never be crushed if brave people do NOT back down. Something did change on March 1st 2023! A lot of the people there did not have real knowledge of what is at stake, or of the big issues facing swampy MCRC. I know many of you do not know this, but when I showed up and asked to go into the Chair Convention (also Endorsement Convention derailed), the armed guards—which alone is unbelievable to have armed guards—refused me access to the room no matter what I said. I then had to send someone in to find the parliamentarian lawyer to come out. After about 5 to 10 minutes he came out and he told me that I couldn’t go in. I said, wait a minute, that’s impossible. I am a member of the Republican Party and I live in Montgomery County and I’m a candidate for Chairman. He said hold on and went back in the room to communicate, I’m sure with the party bosses, on what to do. He came back out and said ‘OK I can come in, but my lawyer couldn’t come in.’ At that point my lawyer and I said if he can’t come in, then this is in no way a proper meeting and I will have to initiate court action. The lawyer then said ‘OK hold on a minute, let me go back.’ About 10 minutes later, he said ‘OK as long as you’re not disruptive’ (I have never been disruptive and I’ve always been respective of all my fellow Republicans even those that I disagree with) and we were allowed to come into the room, but we were not allowed to circulate and had to stay in the back of the room. Why? Why are they run by fear?
Very interesting way to start a supposed “democratic by the rules” convention. To further demonstrate hypocrisy, one of the parliamentarians made a grand speech indicating that there will be no disruptions and that we will follow Robert’s rules and the bylaws. The former of which did not happen. Just a thought – how many elections in the last 20 years have our bylaws won? He then proceeded with the meeting. Of course you all know what happened then, Joe Rooney—who was probably one of the best area republican leaders—and has put his life on the line for our country, stands up to make a point of order in which he asked, “When did Liz resign?” and of course it was brought out that Liz resigned on the 15th of February but then appointed herself as ‘acting chairman’ until the convention. Rewriting the bylaws at their convenience. Now I’ve been doing business for close to 50 years and have dealt with a lot of lawyers; I know all lawyers can make up anything out of everything, so we were told that ‘yes the bylaws do say that the chairman can appoint themselves as a temporary chairman until the chairman is elected,’ even though nowhere in the bylaws does it allow for that.
Joe Rooney wanted to make a motion to postpone the convention and was trying to explain his reasoning as to Why but was then unbelievably told to “Sit down and shut up!” or he would be physically removed from the meeting by those armed guards! I don’t know about you but I was totally shocked. Joe being the consummate gentleman, sat down and the meeting proceeded. You know the rest. 3 minutes to decide the future of MCRC—no questions from the floor—no debate between the candidates and one wonders why MCRC is failing.
What we found out is, there are rules but yet there are NO rules when it comes to having a debate in our Republican Party. If you remember I only had about a week to campaign and I was on vacation which was planned by my wife for four months prior. Plus you also have to remember that Chris Nascimento (nice guy) was basically groomed prior to anybody knowing the exact date that Liz was going to resign. He had an opportunity to collect the myriad of proxy votes (our party’s version of mail-in ballots) and because of this had a tremendous head start. When you calculate the total vote (including proxies) of approximately 500 plus votes and the fact that Chris got 300 plus and I got 200, then if you eliminate the proxy votes, and remember I only had a week to campaign and flew up in 24 hours of the convention, I call it at the very minimum dead even vote.
There’s something else that’s even more important and that is that 50% of the party has no say or position on any of the committees that surround the party chairman. In effect as I said General Patton in one of his famous quotes “if everyone’s thinking the same no one’s thinking”. Remember that if it were not for passionate conservatives and passionate Republicans there would be no MCRC. In fact, as I looked over the room I saw many old timers who have consistently supported the head chairman of MCRC—good, bad or indifferent—and therefore really bear responsibility for the demise of our once great Republican Party. I knew how they would vote. Of course, they never EVER take ANY responsibility. It’s always those darn rebels. There are never any mirrors in their homes.
As of today, I have not had a single call from Christian to ask me how we can bring the party together. How can we demand voter reform, transparency in our debates if we cannot even have transparency or act democratically at our local parties? Why is it that the Party Chairman, especially the one that I think has been replaced, takes criticism or ideas as somehow a personal threat and therefore those people must be destroyed via attacking their character, name-calling, etc. I guess my hope that something would change and there would be an openness and an effort to include everyone is just the impossible dream that I have.
Thank you for your support. I will continue to support individually great candidates who represent common sense conservative principles that have proven over historical times to work. I will never back down from the ineptness of leaders who think they walk on water. I know I don’t. I do know humanity only improves when we challenge each other to be the best version of ourselves.
Thank you for your time.
Stan Casacio
