At closed-door GOP meeting, supporters of Dave Williams reaffirm him as chair as dispute drags on

By Brian Eason2:07 PM MDT on Aug 31, 2024

from The Colorado Sun

Photo: Chairman of the Colorado Republican Party Dave Williams speaks in front of the U.S. Supreme Court, Thursday, Feb. 8, 2024, in Washington. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

In the Colorado Republican Party’s second disputed meeting in as many weeks, supporters of Dave Williams on Saturday reaffirmed the far-right former lawmaker as party chair and attempted to invalidate a vote held last weekend to oust him.

Few opponents of Williams attended the meeting, leaving the party with two landslide votes in either direction on consecutive Saturdays — one to keep him as chair, and one to end his tumultuous tenure.

What comes next in the fight over the party’s leadership isn’t clear. But the dispute appears increasingly unlikely to be resolved internally by the state party, with both sides claiming that the meeting held by the other faction was illegitimate.

As a result, it may need to be settled by the Republican National Committee or in court.

Armed security guards at the entrance Saturday prohibited journalists from The Colorado Sun and other media outlets from attending the gathering, held at The Rock Church in Castle Rock, a suburb south of Denver.

The closed-door meeting came after the party had kicked a Sun reporter out of its April meeting, sparking outcry from Republican elected officials who said the public should be able to observe the party’s business. At that one, other reporters were allowed to attend.

Saturday’s meeting was live-streamed on Facebook.

In remarks before the vote, Williams said he served at the will of the party and its members, and offered to step aside if that was the majority’s preference.

“If you’d like for us to leave, that’s fine,” Williams said. “If you’d like for us to stay, that’s fine, too.

“But we hope to put this matter to rest today and demonstrate to the world that, in fact, there is no separate party that’s running the show.”

The vote in Castle Rock was 191.5 to 10 against removing Williams as chair — but the matter was far from put to rest.

A week earlier in a Brighton meeting that was open to the press, Republicans voted 161.66 to 12 in favor of Williams’ removal, then elected Eli Bremer, a former El Paso County GOP chair, to replace him. (Some participants only have partial votes under party rules.)

“The meeting today was not a legal meeting,” Bremer told the Sun in an interview Saturday. “This is going to go to court.”

The Brighton tally was enough to meet a 60% threshold for Williams’ removal, as required by party bylaws — but only under one interpretation of the rule.

Supporters of Williams on Saturday voted for the rule to be interpreted as 60% of the entire Republican central committee — a group of more than 400 members — while opponents voted to interpret it as 60% of those present at the meeting.

At the meeting, Williams’ supporters blasted the Republicans seeking his removal, saying a “minority faction” was disrupting the party’s ability to win the November election.

“Stop. It has to stop. The people in here that are stirring the pot, stop,” state Rep. Brandi Bradley of Littleton said during a debate before the vote was called. “We need to be fighting the Democrats that are making this state unsafe.”

Opponents of Williams — from the more moderate wing of the state GOP — counter that his leadership has been detrimental to the party’s chances of winning elections in Colorado, citing lackluster fundraising and a number of controversies, including homophobic and transphobic emails. Williams has also used his position to benefit his unsuccessful bid for office and that of some of his allies.

No one spoke against him at the meeting — and only a handful of elected Republicans were in attendance on the roll call vote.

On Saturday, party members also approved changes to their bylaws that would make it harder to call special meetings to remove party leaders in the future. But that decision, too, remains in dispute, with a large chunk of the central committee voting to cancel Saturday’s meeting in Castle Rock when they met Aug. 24 in Brighton.

A similar state party chair controversy in Michigan earlier this year was decided by the RNC.

The National Republican Congressional Committee, the GOP U.S. House campaign arm, said previously it would recognize the results of the Brighton meeting to remove Williams as chair.

Both sides framed the dispute as a battle for the party’s future — and its ability to win elections in Colorado.

Bremer said the differences between the meetings in Brighton and Castle Rock showed why Williams had to be removed.

“We had 100% openness and transparency,” Bremer said, in contrast to Williams’ meeting where the media and other observers were barred from attending. “They would not allow many registered Republicans who showed up to come in and observe.”

But state Rep. Scott Bottoms, an evangelical pastor from Colorado Springs, said his own election to the House two years ago showed that Republicans like Williams were winning.

“We’ve been slowly winning this battle,” Bottoms said at the meeting in Castle Rock. “The liberal Republicans can’t stand that.

“Dave, you’re our guy,” Bottoms added. “One hundred percent, we support you.