Did you honestly expect anything less?
Just one week after being roundly criticized for their failure to add another woman’s voice to their caucus from North Carolina’s 3rd Congressional District, the NRCC apparently has learned nothing. In a tweet criticizing the first (and second) woman Speaker of the House, these brilliant strategists chose to employ the oldest trope in the book that women are too “emotional” to make sound decisions.
As a reminder, here’s what people were saying just last week about the “crisis” of women’s role in the Republican party (gee, I wonder why they haven’t solved it yet…)
The New York Times: The Daily: The Plan to Elect Republican Women
“Out of 198 Republicans in the House of Representatives, just 13 are women. This week, a closely watched election in North Carolina may help determine how serious the party is about changing that.”
“After the midterms in 2018, it kind of hit everyone [in the Republican caucus] like a ton of bricks that this is not just something to work on. This is a crisis.”
“Republicans started to look at Perry as possible a test case for whether the party can actually do this: find a strong candidate who’s a woman competing in an important race and actually get her over the finish line…It’s really for Republicans a test of 2 things. 1. Will voters accept a Republican woman? And 2. Will the leaders of the party…bring themselves to unite behind a woman?”
“Every race is different, but this is certainly a place where they should be able to mount this effort and be successful, in their eyes, and if they can’t, the inevitable question is going to be ‘well where can they?’”
Roll Call: North Carolina likely sending another white male Republican to Congress
“Perry’s defeat is a loss for Republican women’s groups, such as Winning for Women and Susan B. Anthony List, which were hoping to add another woman to the 13 who are currently in the 197-member House GOP conference.”
Politico: Freedom Caucus-backed Murphy wins North Carolina runoff
“Republican voters in an eastern North Carolina congressional race on Tuesday picked state Rep. Greg Murphy to be the party’s nominee for a special election, crushing efforts by some national Republicans to elevate a woman candidate.”
“Failure to boost Perry raises questions about the GOP’s new strategy to diversify its ranks and the limitations of its cash-only strategy. No centralized groups exist to provide hiring advice, social media guidance, or messaging lessons to candidates.”
News & Observer: Murphy defeats candidate backed by GOP women in NC congressional primary runoff
“State Rep. Greg Murphy won Tuesday’s runoff for the Republican nomination in North Carolina’s 3rd Congressional District in a race that exposed a gender rift among U.S. House Republicans and attracted attention from some of the biggest names in Republican politics.”
Wall Street Journal: Greg Murphy Wins North Carolina GOP Congressional Primary Runoff
“Tuesday’s runoff had been watched closely on Capitol Hill as a test of new efforts to elect more Republican women to the U.S. House. The ranks of female GOP lawmakers in the House dwindled to 13 from 23 after the 2018 midterm elections.”
Washington Post: State Rep. Greg Murphy wins GOP nomination for House seat in North Carolina
“The race had been viewed by some as a test of women’s standing within the Republican Party. Perry had won the endorsements of all 13 House Republican women and received nearly $1 million in support from an outside group created to boost female Republican House candidates.”
“Some Republican women have sounded the alarm, saying their party needs to be more responsive to the concerns of female voters and should make the recruitment of female candidates a top priority.”
CBS News: North Carolina candidate tests GOP efforts to elect more women to Congress
And here’s a quick recap of some other recent examples of the NRCC being forced to play defense after making outrageous and problematic statements:
The Hill: Republicans raise concerns over House campaign arm leadership
“His team is inept. They have no idea what they’re doing, and their strategy is not putting Republicans in a good position to take back the House,” one disgruntled GOP lawmaker told The Hill.
“I think in the larger conversation, what I see is, is just a lack of strategy, and just a series of trolling,” a former Republican National Committee official said. “And that can be fun to do, but not as fun as winning House races.”
Yahoo News: Colin Kaepernick’s skin appears darkened in Republican campaign fundraiser ad
“House Republicans are running on racism, plain and simple. It’s disgusting, it’s offensive and it should be fireable, but there’s no accountability in the Republican Party,” the operative said.
Pictures of President Trump and Kaepernick appear side-by-side in the message. The photo of Kaepernick appears to have been altered to make his skin several shades darker than it is in original copies of the image. In an email to Yahoo News, NRCC communications director Chris Pack insisted, “The photo was not darkened.”
Politico: Republicans fear campaign arm is stumbling in fight for the House
“It’s a disaster what is going on across the street at NRCC,” said one GOP lawmaker, who was granted anonymity to speak more freely. “Their communication is bad. Some of the stuff is bizarrely overly aggressive. They’re not raising the money. They don’t have buy-in from members. And it’s getting worse.”
“I was bothered by that attack on Max Rose,” said Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.). “The president’s got his own unique style. I don’t think we need to mimic it. I was really disappointed by that and I hope we do better.”
“Republicans just called a female Air Force combat veteran a “socialist loser.” Yeesh, not a good look for the Trump Party.”
“The issue is GOP desperation. Are the Republicans already in such a state of panic about Congressman Steve Chabot’s re-election bid that the party would stoop this low some 16 months away from the 2020 election?”