Infighting over former President Donald Trump is driving a wedge between Michigan Republicans, causing them to lose out on key donors that could make or break their success in the 2024 election.
The Michigan GOP is divided between those who support Trump's 2020 election fraud claims and those who are looking to move the party forward and gain much-needed wins in the state and federal legislatures in 2024, particularly after a worse-than-expected performance in 2022. However, to do that, donations will be needed — something the party is severely lacking.
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“It’s not going real well, and all you have to do is look at the facts,” Rep. Lisa McClain (R-MI) told the New York Times. “The ability to raise money, we’ve got a lot of donors sitting on the sideline. That’s not an opinion. That’s a fact. It’s just a plain fact. We have to fix that.”
Republicans' loss of a foothold in Michigan can be traced back to 2021 when new party leaders emerged who promoted false election theories and looked to only support candidates who would defend Trump's debunked claims that the election was stolen. Some of those leaders include Matthew DePerno, Kristina Karamo, and former Michigan GOP co-chair Meshawn Maddock.
Karamo has since taken over as chairwoman of the Michigan Republican Party, deepening the divide within the party. Her victory showed just how deeply ingrained beliefs of election denial are in the state's top GOP leaders.
Her refusal to concede her 2022 election loss and her hard-line conservative agenda have forced the party to take severe cuts to donations. In fact, the party has lost money since Karamo took over, with less than $150,000 in the bank as of June 30, according to Federal Election Commission records. Four years ago at this time, the party had almost three times as much cash on hand, according to the New York Times.
To combat the lack of donations to the state party, longtime Michigan Republican legislators are making an effort to shift funding directly into the state House Republican caucus to win back at least one chamber in 2024.
Former Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder, one of the last Republicans elected statewide in Michigan since Trump won in 2016, and some DeVos family network members have donated large sums to the Michigan House GOP caucus. The House Republican caucus is outpacing the House Democratic caucus $2.3 million to $1.7 million, despite being in the minority.
This is a sign that Michigan Republicans are looking to move away from the state party leaders, whose defeats in past years are placing the GOP in an uphill battle for any chance at victory in 2024.
Karamo and DePerno maintained a pattern of spreading conspiracy theories about the 2020 election, making it a focus of their 2022 campaigns. They ran for secretary of state and attorney general, respectively.
Their nominations, however, pushed away donations from key figures like Betsy DeVos, a major GOP figurehead in Michigan who resigned from Trump's administration following the Jan. 6 Capitol riots. The DeVos family withheld funds from most of the state party in the midterm elections, pushing other moderate Republican donors to follow suit.
In 2022, Karamo and DePerno lost, Republicans lost control over the state legislature, and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D-MI) was reelected in a landslide. Michigan Republicans blamed multiple people for the party's midterm defeat.
The state party blamed the unelectability of Tudor Dixon, who Whitmer beat. Dixon, in turn, blamed state Republican leadership. Maddock blamed donors for not supporting their candidates.
A state party memo analyzing the 2022 outcome, made public by Dixon, showed that Republicans "found ourselves consistently navigating the power struggle between Trump and anti-Trump factions of the party” and that Trump “provided challenges on a statewide ballot.”
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Recent legal cases against the party aren't likely to appeal to donors, either. Sixteen people in the state, several with Michigan Republican Party ties, were charged by Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel's office for signing certificates claiming that Trump won the election in 2020. Maddock was one of them, pleading not guilty to several felonies.
“Tell me how that helps. Tell me how that helps get the swing voter,” McClain said. “Voters don’t care about the infighting. The swing voter wants to know, how are your policies going to help me have a better life for my family?”