The impending struggle between the GOP Establishment and grassroots elements begins to take shape | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's Note: This article originally appeared in the Beaufort Observer.

    Beaufort County will be sending 28 people to Charlotte June 7-9 to the North Carolina Republican Party Convention. The cadre was self-selected at the recent County Convention. Any registered Republican who wanted to attend was able to sign up because there were more slots allocated than were taken. But its unclear where each of the delegates stands on the issues that will be dealt with in Charlotte because there was no campaign in which candidates had to express their positions. What is for sure is that the Beaufort County people will walk into a fight.

    Essentially, the fight will be between the Establishment and the Grassroots. That, of course, is an oversimplification but it is sufficient to characterize the two dominate sides within the Republican Party. The vehicle for the fight will be a move by the Grassroots element to have the changes in the National GOP rules that were enacted last summer in Tampa rolled back.

    At the National GOP meeting the Establishment element, led mainly by Chairman Robin Hayes, sided with the Romney campaign and other Establishment types in supporting the rules changes. Hayes upset a number of people in the manner in which he acted. He has recently announced that he will not be seeking re-election as chair. Wayne King, the current Vice-Chair has taken a job in Washington, DC and is not running. The Establishment has put up Claude Pope, the cousin and handpicked choice of Governor Pat McCrory, for chair.

    Some in the Beaufort County delegation are still upset about how Establishment types in Raleigh inserted themselves into the candidate selection process in last spring's primary. GOP leaders in the Legislature, along with 3 District Congressman Walter Jones selected Arthur Williams, a long-time Democrat who switched parties after he was rejected by the Democrat Establishment (they have the same divisions in that party) to fill a vacancy in the Senate District 1 seat when Marc Basnight resigned. When he announced his candidacy Williams proclaimed he had the blessing of the Raleigh leadership. Many within the Beaufort GOP supported conservative grassroots candidate Mattie Lawson. Some supported Jeremy Adams who ran as a grassroots "Liberty" candidate. Adams lost in the first primary. Williams called for a runoff when he came in second and then "hired" Adams to support him. He also paid several other local Republicans to support him but tried to camouflage the fact by listing corporate names on his campaign reports. The word on the street was that Bill Tarpenning and Ashley Woolard were the actual "hired guns" Williams was bankrolling. Some accused Greg Dority of being included, but Dority has been coy about it. Woolard made several public appearances and spoke against Lawson. Lawson won the second primary, defeating Williams even in his own home county. But Williams, Dority, Tarpenning, Woolard and Adams did not support Republican Lawson in the General Election and Democrat Paul Tine won the seat that had been in Republican hands since Bill Cook defeated Williams.

    All this played out in Beaufort's County Convention when Dority ran for Chairman. He was defeated by Keith Kidwell by nearly 2 to 1.

    The delegation going to Charlotte is divided between those who supported Dority and those who supported Kidwell. The role the party Establishment types played in the Williams-Lawson race will be an undercurrent in Charlotte.

    But essentially the overarching issue is that of whether the Establishment is going to accommodate the grassroots element of the party. That element is viewed as more libertarian, with many of them supporting Ron Paul and now supporting his son Rand Paul to become President. The TEA Party element is also contributing a significant number of grassroots delegates to the State meeting.

    Of course, few delegates fit neatly and exclusively into one camp or the other on all issues but the fight over the rollback of the 2012 rules changes at the National Convention and probably the election of the chair and state Executive Committee will be the vehicles for the struggle between the various elements of the GOP. Ultimately, "the prize" in the struggle will be who gets the Republican nomination to run against Kay Hagan in 2014.

    Brant Clifton, the publisher of the Daily Haymaker website that chronicles GOP politics in the state has been publishing a number of article on the fight within the GOP. His most recent can be read by clicking here.

    The grassroots element has recently published a You Tube video explaining their perspective on the on the upcoming fight. You can watch the video below: