WASHINGTON – South Carolina Republican Party chair Katon Dawson predicted Monday that president-elect Barack Obama will “overreach” during his first two years in office, giving the national GOP an opportunity to rebuild.
At a televised debate with five other candidates seeking the chairmanship of the Republican National Committee, Dawson also argued that his experience winning elections in South Carolina had prepared him to lead the battered national party.
“With the Obama administration overreaching and overpromising…we’re going to have our opportunities in our states to elect some very responsible, conservative Republicans and we’re going to be able to elect them in places some people don’t think is possible,” he said.
During the 90-minute debate sponsored by the anti-tax group Americans for Tax Reform, all six candidates said the party needed to refocus after losing the White House and Congress to Democrats over the last two election cycles.
Though Republicans remain dominant in much of the South, Obama became the first Democrat in decades to win North Carolina and Virginia. And Republicans lost significant ground to Democrats in other regions of the country this year.
All six candidates – five challengers and incumbent chair Mike Duncan – blamed the party’s woes on problems connecting with minority voters, poor communication, and an abandonment of core conservative principles of limited government and lower spending over the last eight years.
Former Ohio Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell, former Maryland Lt. Gov Michael Steele, former Tennessee Republican Party chairman Chip Saltsman, and Michigan Republican Party chairman Saul Anuzis are also seeking the position.
The 168 members of the Republican National Committee will meet at the end of the month to select a new chair. Some committee members have argued that the party needs a new leader from outside the South, the one region where it remains dominant, in order to return to prominence.
In an interview after the debate, Dawson said he interpreted talk of looking beyond the conservative Southern base “as code for moderating our party.”
“That’s what got us into the trouble we’re in now. Conservative principles are how we’re going to bring our party back,” he said.
In one of the few somewhat tense exchanges in the debate, Blackwell implicitly questioned whether Dawson’s experience winning elections in conservative South Carolina had adequately prepared him to win in old swing states like Ohio and Florida and new ones like Virginia and North Carolina.
“We all know how difficult it is to win elections in that swing state of South Carolina,” Blackwell deadpanned.
Dawson shot back: “Mr. Blackwell thinks winning in our state is easy. It’s hard.”
The debate also included questions on personal gun ownership – from none for Steele to “too many to count” for Dawson – and asked the candidates to name the biggest mistake of the Bush administration.
Several candidates named Bush’s expansion of government spending in defiance of the party’s principles, the Wall Street bailout, and the handling of the war in Iraq.
Dawson identified Bush’s decision to press ahead on an overhaul of the Social Security system and immigration laws.
“Those were two (issues) that tore our party apart at certain times,” he said.
