Indiana State GOP Approves Rigging of Hamilton County Chairman Election

In what should be an affront to every grass roots Republican party worker who toils in the trenches, the Indiana State GOP Rules Committee today reinstated 71 mummy dummy precinct appointments that had been made by outgoing Hamilton County GOP county chairman Peter Emigh in order to rig the election for the candidate, Fishers City Councilor Pete Peterson, he supports as his replacement.  The appointments had been vacated by Vice County GOP Chairman Laura Campbell who became acting chairman upon Emigh's resignation.

Pete Peterson

Many of the Emigh mummy dummy PCs did not even know they were appointed prior to the chairman's resignation. The appointees included Peterson's daughter, his mortgage broker, vendors who do business with Fishers, Fishers city employees, and others that were certain votes for Peterson.  Only a few of the mummy dummy appointees had been involved previously in Hamilton County politics.  Of course, the sole reason for a "mummy dummy" to be appointed to a PC or VPC slot is to attend a convention or a caucus and outvote elected PCs and others who do the actual grunt work in the party.

I have not yet seen a document justifying the Rules Committee's decision.  Two state party rules would seem to completely control the matter.  One is that precinct committeemen and vice precinct committeemen have to be appointed 30 days before the resignation of a county chairman to be eligible to vote for the chairman's replacement.   The Rules Committee must have completely ignored this rule which is in place precisely to prevent the sort of thing that happened with Emigh's appointments. The other rule is that the county chairman has absolute discretion to remove appointed PCs and VPCs. 

Although it was self-serving, Campbell was exactly right to remove the appointees. To allow scores of mummy dummy PCs and VPCs to vote this weekend for Emigh's replacement, is an insult to the hundreds of Hamilton County GOP activists who toil in the trenches, making phone calls, knocking on doors, stuffing envelopes.  There are few rewards for that type of grass roots party work, but one is the ability to vote for county chairman and other county leadership.  Today the Rules Committee told those workers too bad, that people who haven't done a lick of party work have an equal right with party workers to cast a vote for county chairman.

The Rules Committee today could have handed down a decision that supported the power and authority of grass roots party workers.  Instead they sided with party bosses who rig elections to stomp on the preferences of those grass roots workers.  Let's hope in the days ahead that the State GOP organization revisits the issue and rewrites the rules and enforces them to protect party workers instead of party bosses.