A Virtual RNC?
American Crossroads is no ordinary 527 group. The group has set itself a $50 million fundraising target. If achieved, that money would establish American Crossroads as a nearly equivalent entity to the Republican National Committee. Redundancy? No - rivalry.
American Crossroads is no ordinary 527 group. The group has set itself a $50 million fundraising target. If achieved, that money would establish American Crossroads as a nearly equivalent entity to the Republican National Committee. Redundancy? No - rivalry.
The group's leadership is thick with prominent Republicans who have taken more or less public stances against RNC chairman Michael Steele.
Board members will include Michael Steele's immediate predecessor as RNC chairman, Mike Duncan. It's reported that Ed Gillespie and Karl Rove will advise the group. The group's CEO is Steve Laws, former general counsel of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has had remarkable success over the past 18 months raising money for anti-Obama messages.
First reaction:
1) Looks like Michael Steele's job is secure despite donor unhappiness: Nobody creates an entire new bureaucracy to work around a CEO if that CEO could simply be fired instead.
2) Campaign finance reform has achieved another brilliantly perverse result: Thanks to the new 527 entities, it's possible to create an alternative to the RNC that can raise unlimited funds from secret donors. Nice work, Sens. McCain and Feingold!
3) Is it wrong to see 2010 as Karl Rove's comeback campaign? While the names associated with American Crossroads reveal many fundraisers and organizers, based on first reports Rove looks like the group's pre-eminent strategist. If so, it will mark a curious evolution for Rove. In 2004, Rove waged and won a presidential campaign based in part on the appeal of Medicare Part D. Six years later, will Rove lead a campaign of born-again Tea Party libertarianism?
4) 2010 is shaping up as a nationalized election. Large central organizations will bombard the country with messages designed in Washington D.C. That approach worked for Republicans in 1994 Interestingly, however, Democrats took exactly the opposite approach in their big triumph in 2006. Democrats that year allowed local candidates a lot of leeway to establish their own identities, distinct from the national party. Question: will a national campaign suffused by Tea Party themes help or hurt plausible Republicans running in blue states, like Mark Kirk in Illinois and whoever emerges as the GOP standard bearer against Barbara Boxer in California?