I saw a meme the other day that said, “Never again should anybody have to be amazed at how Jim Jones got his followers to drink the poison.”
A few days after Christmas, I sent an email about the rule violations and dishonesty by the “new” Greenville GOP officers (I know, who wants political emails during the Holidays…). I had no expectation that they would admit they were violating rules, but I’m told that thanks to Mr. Ray Sheen taking a stand, the officers were forced to have the Executive Committee vote on canceling the rest of the Party’s meetings. Correctly canceling future meetings does not negate the violation of the improper cancellation of the November and January meetings. A motion or directive passed by our Executive Committee cannot be ignored by a lower body or a single person, just like a motion or directive given by the SCGOP’s Executive Committee cannot be ignored by a county party.
If you’re like me and have been getting the daily propaganda emails from MYSCGOP (starting before Christmas and continuing each day), you may have caught their excuse for breaking rules. They claim that they were breaking rules because Jennifer Black didn’t turn the minutes over and they couldn’t have known the EC voted to establish monthly meetings. This kind of nonsense is continually done, but not everyone is falling for it. It’s no secret who pushed for monthly meetings and backed the motion that established them at the June 2021 meeting! Now they want to go eight months without one.
With each email attack on respected elected officials like Lt. Governor Pamela Evette, US Congressman Russell Fry, SC Superintendent of Education Ellen Weaver, churches, and I’m sure many others to come, Republicans and even followers of MYSCGOP are being alerted that there is something off. If you read the email from MYSCGOP attacking Ellen Weaver and her family, you read where they complain about electronic voting. How ironic that the same day that the email attack went out, these same people held a vote electronically! You would also have seen the term “ballot harvesting” used when it is well-known that the SCGOP Form 1 does not contain a single name or a single race. It is not a ballot, yet they dishonestly keep using that term to get low-intelligent followers agitated. I’m happy to hear that so many of you aren’t falling for this dishonesty—you know what ballot harvesting is and aren’t letting it be redefined to trick you.
Other MYSCGOP emails attack people and the SCGOP for lacking integrity. Is integrity when multiple county party officers claim to have seen Walt Horin’s voting record and that he qualifies when we know his voting record proves he has only voted in one primary--the June 2022 Republican Primary? Why won’t they be transparent and simply release this record they claim to have seen? The answer is because it doesn’t exist. Is integrity when Mr. Mike Voaden sitting in a room with more than 50 Party officials elected by the grassroots while we discussed and voted on reconvening the State Convention and then Mr. Voaden walking out and saying it was never discussed or voted on? The audio of the meeting proves he continues to be dishonest (click here to listen).
After the county party officers were called out on violating rules by canceling meetings without the Executive Committee’s vote, I’m told that an extremely low number of ECs participated and electronically voted to cancel all remaining meetings that were scheduled. This means that there will be eight months without a meeting of the Greenville County Republican Party Executive Committee! Many believe this was done because the dwindling financial balance they have left is going to fund the MYSCGOP building instead of a climate-controlled meeting space. This self-proclaimed “transparent” group refuses to release what the total cost to lease the dilapidated 2505 Wade Hampton building and how much other groups are paying or if the GCGOP is paying the entire lease and the other groups are using it at no expense.
When the GCGOP is following its mission, fundraising is not an issue. This officer group is too busy trying to remove our Republican elected officials and take over the SCGOP and failing to raise funds. Without including any ReOrg related income, my team and I raised $39k my first term and $35k my second. The fundraising totals listed on a recent zoom call may be the worst in recent history with only $3,900 cash on hand going into ReOrg season. You’ll hear these nefarious people claim that “the old guard” tried to keep ReOrg a secret, which is verifiably false since we spent $4,500 just on talk radio ads going out about ReOrg to tens of thousands of people. Unfortunately, the current balance wouldn’t even cover our radio ads, let alone all the other costs associated with a properly run ReOrg. I hope our convention isn’t going to be in a hayfield with instructions to BYOC (bring your own chair) or flashlight.
A more concerning issue is why this new officer team stopped doing quarterly ethics filings as has been the practice of the Greenville County Republican Party for as long as anyone can remember. This and other questionable decisions is why some are calling on a third party financial review.
It's indisputable that rules are currently being broken. We should be thankful that Mr. Ray Sheen took a stand against one specific rule violation, but why are he and other good people silent on other clear rule violations like Walt Horin’s voting record? The county party is led by a board. When multiple officers are caught being dishonest and the rest of the board is silent, the entire board is complicit in the dishonesty if they refuse to take a stand for the truth. I wish I were at liberty to share how this is affecting a few of them outside of politics. It never ceases to amaze me how small South Carolina is and who is watching this trainwreck.
This current group’s inability to raise needed funds, follow rules, support our Republican nominees, all while going eight months without meetings begs the question—Why do we even need a county party? This question is very appropriate especially since much of the responsibilities the “new” Greenville GOP fails to do ends up being done by other Republican groups, especially former chairs.
History is full of good people joining movements and accomplishing great things. It also gives us many examples of people following men to extremes. Just last night a wise person told me that “good people have been made to believe something, but if they open their eyes, they will see that what is happening is clearly wrong.” It’s time for good people to take their heads out of the sand and see that this current group has failed in the mission of our Party, is being dishonest, and they should be held politically accountable.
