Chief Sponsor: GOP Purity Test Not Dead
Click here for all of Tim Mak’s reports from the RNC Summit in Hawaii.
UPDATE: RNC Chairman Michael Steele tells reporters that "after the expression of the chairmen's meeting, where the chairmen unanimously rejected (the purity test)," it might be "problematic" for Bopp to bring the resolution to the floor.
Steele continued pounding away at the Bopp resolution, saying that, "the idea for creating a test to be a Republican, to me, feels counter to everything that Ronald Reagan stood for."
Posted at 5:10pm
As the RNC’s winter meeting heads into several days of deliberation, Indiana National Committeeman Jim Bopp tells FrumForum that he feels confident that something resembling his ‘purity test’ resolution will be adopted.
Bopp is the RNC member who proposed the so-called ‘purity test’ resolution, which laid out a list of ten policy principles that Republican candidates should adhere to. As FrumForum reported later, Bopp also decided to introduce a second resolution, dubbed the ‘accountability resolution’. The newer resolution is, in essence, a watered-down proposal stripped of the litmus test for Republican Party candidates.
Today, about a dozen state chairmen agreed unanimously to oppose the purity test resolution in a non-binding vote. Despite this, Bopp remains hopeful that his ideas will be implemented in some form.
“I think that some form of an accountability resolution will be passed,” said Bopp. “I think we have gained momentum [over the last few months] because you see everyone here [at the RNC winter meeting] talking about it.”
Counter-intuitively, Bopp argued that his resolutions would actually help the party grow in size by attracting disillusioned conservatives. He argued that if the Republican Party didn’t return to its core principles, a third-party would be right around the corner.
“We’ve got to bring disaffected conservatives back to the Republican Party,” Bopp told FrumForum, explaining the reasoning behind his resolutions. “That’s what we have to be focused on.”
However, Jim Bopp did concede to some extent that the purity test resolution could bar qualified Republican candidates in certain areas:
The purity test “may, in certain areas, imperfectly take into account the circumstances of a particular race,” said Bopp. “That’s the down side.”
Mr. Bopp, who practices law in Indiana, admitted that while he’s confident the RNC membership will see it his way, he hasn’t actually talked to very many members of the committee to gauge their support. “I have not talked to most, all or even a substantial number of the committee,” he said.
That said, the need for clear, conservative action at the RNC is urgent, Bopp said. "We've got to stop Obama's socialist agenda,” he added.