General Counsel to Trump Campaign Cautions TN GOP Against Removing Duly Elected Delegates to Convention

Kaitlin Housler
Donald Trump

Since the March 5 primary results were announced, the GOP rumor mill has been filled with claims that several members of the Tennessee Republican State Executive Committee (SEC) intend to challenge the “Republican bona fides” of some of the elected Trump delegates at an April 6 meeting of the SEC. Such a challenge would be unprecedented and fraught with legal and political complications.

General Counsel David Warrington with Dhillon Law Group, which represents former President Donald Trump’s 2024 campaign, addressed such complications in a letter sent to Tennessee Republican Party Chairman Scott Golden on Friday.

Letter to TN GOP from Trump Campaign

“We have been made aware of an organized effort to remove several Trump delegates and alternates from their duly elected positions,” the letter, obtained by The Tennessee Star, said. “The individuals who were elected to represent President Trump on March 5, 2024, as delegates and alternates to the Republican National Convention are the only delegates and alternates that the Trump Campaign will recognize.”

“Any dispute about a delegate or alternate position will be adjudicated by the Committee on Credentials of the Republican National Committee,” the letter continued. “If any delegate or alternate is removed by the Tennessee Republican Party, that delegate or alternate will receive the full support of President Trump’s campaign to be credentialed at the Republican National Convention. In addition, any delegate or alternate who does not respect the wishes of the campaign and chooses to attack their fellow Trump supporters will not receive the campaign’s support at the credentials committee.”

“All Republicans must cease any infighting and focus their attention on Joe Biden and the radical Democrats,” the letter added.

“Bona fide Republicans,” according to the Bylaws and Rules of the Tennessee Republican Party, are individuals who have voted in at least three of the four most recent statewide Republican primary elections.

Among the possible points of contention surrounding a potential challenge to a duly elected delegate are the following:

1. Uncertainty over whether the standard for “Bona Fide Republican” that applies to candidates for public office—having voted in three of the last four statewide Republican primaries—also applies to candidates for delegate to the Republican National Convention.
2. Whether a challenge to the Republican bona fides of a candidate for delegate can be made after the candidate has been certified as eligible to placed on the ballot by the Secretary of State, and after the candidate has been duly elected in a statewide primary.
3. Whether a Tennessee Republican Party decision to remove a duly elected delegate conflicts with the Secretary of State’s statutory requirement to certify the election of a delegate who has received the number of votes in the March 5 primary needed to be declared a delegate.

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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Kaitlin on X / Twitter.

 

 

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