The College Republican National Committee released a statement on Thursday evening that criticized former President Donald Trump‘s conviction as “politically motivated prosecution,” but added that the “verdict was handed down by jurors whose decisions were made in accordance with our criminal justice system. As such, the outcome of this trial should be respected.”
This statement was heavily criticized by figures including Daily Wire personality Matt Walsh, attorney Harmeet Dillon, numerous College Republican chapters, and members of the RNC Youth Advisory Council. Moreover, one national board member resigned and said that the CRNC was “largely defunct due to inept national leadership.” It was only the latest controversy for the embattled organization, whose near-total collapse has had a negative effect on college campuses across the country.
The CRNC first faced troubles after the hotly contested 2021 election for national chair. In that race, the outgoing chairman prevented some state federations from voting by using questionable tactics in order for his preferred successor to be elected. By 2022, the organization as a whole started to falter, and received criticism from the chairwoman of the House Republican Conference, Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY).
To fill the void left by the decaying CRNC, the National Federation of College Republicans was formed and began consolidating chapters in 2022. However, the NFCR’s growth slowed after a new organization, the College Republicans of America, was founded in 2023. While it is unclear which group is currently the largest, both the NFCR and CRA claim more chapters than the CRNC.
In the aftermath of the guilty verdict, the NFCR condemned the trial as “a specifically tailored and manufactured scheme against Former President Donald J. Trump,” while the CRA said “this trial was purely politically motivated.”
Moreover, both organizations criticized the CRNC’s statement about the trial as embarrassing for conservative students. The CRA went one step further, “calling on the Republican National Committee to formally recognize CRA as the sole legitimate national College Republicans organization.”
While these three groups duke it out to claim national dominance, one more organization, College Republicans United, is outflanking them on the far Right and has held events hosting Nick Fuentes and the “QAnon Shaman.” Since Trump’s conviction, they have retweeted Fuentes and said that “it’s only a matter of time before there’s a Fort Sumter moment.” Needless to say, this group is fundamentally unserious and has very few existing chapters.
Nevertheless, the national landscape for College Republicans is dismal, and the CRNC’s collapse has made conservative students turn to organizations like Young Americans for Freedom or the more controversial Turning Point USA. However, neither of these groups are able to provide the same connections or opportunities that a competent national College Republicans organization could.
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The virtual dissolution of the Republican Party’s student wing is extremely unfortunate, especially as the College Democrats have fully embraced the far Left. Earlier this year, that organization released a statement supporting the pro-Hamas protesters on college campuses and called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. While there will probably never be a College Republicans group as strong as the College Democrats simply due to being outnumbered, the unforced errors being made by national leadership are undermining conservative causes on campus.
While the next steps for College Republicans are unclear, having four competing national organizations is certainly not helping the conservative movement.