GOP chairwoman Ronna McDaniel painted a rosy picture of the Republican Party headed into the 2024 election on Sunday, namely a united front, candidates supporting one another, and Donald Trump accepting the results of an election.
Her picture, however, seemed devoid of the reality her party members have lived in.
In her first interview since her contentious reelection last month, McDaniel presented a mission statement of unity, one she said propelled her to a fourth term. “We can't be so vicious and vitriolic with each other that we don't want to support each other in the end,” she told CNN’s Dana Bash. “I'm already working to bring the committee together but I think this is a symbol of our party.”
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She then made a litany of claims, including all Republican candidates will sign a pledge to support the eventual 2024 nominee in order to appear on the debate stage. “Everybody should support the will of the voters,” she said. “We’re not going to defeat Joe Biden if we get in this tit for tat of, ‘I'm not going to support this nominee or I'm not going to support this one.’ So that's why we want to put this to bed early.”
But not everyone in McDaniel’s party agrees. Multiple prominent Republicans, including former House Speaker Paul Ryan, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, and even McDaniel’s uncle Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT), have all said they would not support Trump if he becomes the nominee in 2024.
The most notable, however, is Donald Trump. Trump told Hugh Hewitt earlier this month that his potential support “would depend on the nominee,” just as it was in 2016—on a GOP debate stage. McDaniel demurred, saying Trump would sign the pledge and debate. “I think President Trump would like to be on the debate stage. That's what he likes to do,” she said.
Until he doesn’t. Trump famously skipped two 2016 primary debates, pointing to his distaste for Megyn Kelly and his general disinterest in debating John Kasich. Bash didn’t press McDaniel on his past precedent, but history has not offered support for McDaniel’s assertions.
McDaniel also promised the party would accept the 2024 election results, bullishly saying the nominee would accept “because they’re going to be the president” though acknowledging in any event the party would “move forward.”
That too, however, contradicts reality. Bash noted that McDaniel’s successor as Michigan GOP chairperson is an election denier, and Kari Lake—elevated as the speaker of CPAC’s prestigious Ronald Reagan Dinner—has made election-denying her brand. But none raises the bar more than Donald Trump, who has repeatedly railed against the 2020 election results nearly three years after voters ousted him.
Still, McDaniel feels hopeful for the party she’s chosen to govern.
“I will say the path forward is a united Republican Party,” she said. “We’ve got to find our way to be there.”
