The Washington Post said Michael Steele had the worst year in Washington, but that hasn’t stopped him for running for another term as RNC Chairman. Conservative leaders like Sen. Jim DeMint and Newt Gingrich have openly stated that they are looking for alternatives, while one BYU student has been campaigning against Steele for months.
Thomas Schultz, a senior at BYU and the founder of replacemichaelsteele.com, an online petition, was not surprised when Steele announced that he would run again, even in the midst of controversy.
“There were rumors Steele would drop out, but he has a fair number of votes at this stage,” he said. “People always drop out, and polls don’t tell you who the second choice will be.”
When he started his petition in November, Schultz took a position of “anyone but Steele, but I didn’t know who else existed. ” He insists that the number of names on the petition (491 currently) is not the important thing, but that the mere fact of a petition sends a message to the RNC, the most important one being “Steele does not have the youth appeal he promises.”
Steele has made attempts on and off to reach out to youth voters. Last year, Steele told reporters the RNC needed to update its image in urban settings.
“We need messengers to really capture that region — young, Hispanic, black, a cross section,” Steele told the Washington Times. “We want to convey that the modern-day GOP looks like the conservative party that stands on principles. But we want to apply them to urban-surburban hip-hop settings.”
The remarks were a source of comedy for the Colbert Report and a number of websites. Later last year, Steele tried to make the case to young voters to oppose gay marriage on economic grounds.
It might not be a surprise, then, that a college student’s petition has garnered attention. After a wave of media attention cast the petition into the limelight, Schultz was able to connect with high-ranking members of the RNC, and give his message directly to those responsible for choosing the next RNC chairman.
Schultz believes removing Steele will allow the RNC to address the most critical area for 2012: money.
“We need more aggressive fundraising,” Schultz said. “More Alinsky style politics. We should take from the same playbook as Barack Obama.”
The “playbook” Schultz refers to is Rules For Radicals, a 1971 work by leftist community organizer Saul Alinsky. Alinsky frames himself as a kind of Anti-Machiavellian Machiavelli.
Fundraising has been a problem for the RNC during Steele’s tenure. The RNC will enter the 2012 presidential election cycle with more than $20 million in debt — a result of poor fundraising and spending practices.
“The Prince was written by Machiavelli for the Haves on how to hold power,” Schultz said. “[This book] is written for the Have-Nots on how to take it away.”
Now that he has examined the candidates, Schultz is leaning towards the election of Reince Prebus, chair of the Wisconsin RNC.
“(He’s) a prolific fundraiser and a political operative, not a politician,” Schultz said.
Kate Havard is a junior at St. John’s College and a member of the Student Free Press Association.
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