Monday evening, attorney & GRA President Alex Johnson held a Virtual Town Hall about his proposed Accountability Rule which has been submitted for business at the GA GOP State Convention in Columbus. The Town Hall was conduct over Zoom and delegates, alternates, and GRA members from across the state logged into hear him explain the rule and answer their questions. GRA NFRA Director Nathaniel Darnell served as moderator. The Town Hall went for nearly two hours, covering a lot of ground. You can watch it in its entirety now on our YouTube channel here:
The Cobb County GOP sends close to the largest delegation to the state convention most years. It also sends delegations to four congressional districts conventions now.
In the past, elected officials have usually been placed at the front of the line to serve as delegates, even though many of these elected officials stand on the sidelines and don’t participate in controversial votes at the conventions, so as not to upset their constituents. Their delegate votes thus are often wasted.
This year the Nominating Committee for Cobb County adopted a new policy: “We chose to prioritize and give preference to our hard-working grassroots volunteers in the county who have labored to help the organization, the cause, and candidate campaigns completely at their own expense—without expecting any financial reward— over elected officials,” said Cobb Nominating Committee Chairman Nathaniel Darnell. Nathaniel also serves as the Chairman for the Cobb County RA chapter. Chris Deeb, the President of the Cobb RA chapter, served as Vice Chairman of the Nominating Committee. Nine other conservatives, activists, and former candidates from the county also served on the committee.
“This was not to disrespect any Republican elected official in Cobb County, but rather to honor the many men and women upon whose shoulders they stand: our grassroots volunteers,” Nathaniel continued. As a result, all Cobb County elected officials were placed on the alternate list by default during early Nominating Committee deliberations. By the conclusion, the committee voted to remove only one Cobb Republican elected official from both the delegate and alternate lists due to bad behavior in the state legislature.
This policy represents a shift in thinking within the Georgia Republican Party: Instead of the grassroots being treated as being at the bottom of the totem pole with the elite elected officials, corporate lobbyists, and paid political industry riding on their backs, true self-sacrificing Patriots were given the foremost respect.
These are people with nothing to gain from their activism (other than just working to make the world a better place). We suggest that this group is more likely to be objective about what is best for the party, since they aren’t thinking about how to climb the ladder or make money in the political industry.
While some paid members of the political industry, such as Brittany Ellison from east Cobb (who has also publicly posted false and vulgar attacks about fellow Republicans on her social media), took to the microphone to complain about being nominated as merely an alternate behind grassroots volunteers, no one at the Cobb County GOP Convention complained about the elected officials taking a back seat. No one made a motion to move up an elected official in Cobb from an alternate to a delegate position. The Nominating Committee’s policy concerning elected officials was therefore approved by the body at the county convention.
Those who sacrificially give of their “three Ts” (their time, their treasure, and their talents) expecting no personal enrichment, should always be given such preference. They are the heart and soul of the Republican Party.