Gov. Phil Scott suggested Tuesday that the Vermont Republican Party consider finding new party leadership after suffering major losses in legislative races last month.
In an emailed statement to VTDigger, Scott’s spokesperson, Rebecca Kelley, compared changing leadership in the party to the Red Sox in 2012 hiring a new manager to turn things around.
“There may be a need or desire for change, but that will be up to the State Committee to decide,” Kelley wrote. “In 2012, after the Red Sox finished last in their division, they fired head coach Bobby Valentine, hired a new manager and went on to win the World Series the following year.”
The comments from the governor’s office come after an election in November that left Vermont’s Republicans with historically low numbers in the Legislature. With only 43 votes in the 150-seat House and six members in the 30-seat Senate, Republicans no longer have the power to protect the governor’s veto pen from a Democratic override.
The latest statement comes after a member of the state party’s platform committee warned Republicans in an email last week that Senate Minority Leader Joe Benning, R-Caledonia, and other moderate members of the party were planning a “revolt” against the party’s leadership.
Vermont Republican Party Chair Deb Billado agreed in a statement Tuesday that the party needs to “review its leadership across the board.”
“The status of the party is not because of any one misstep,” Billado wrote. “The state committee has the opportunity to make any changes they deem necessary. I look forward to working with them to help move the party in the right direction.”
Scott’s candidate for party leader, Mike Donohue, lost out to Billado in a November 2017 election to replace former chair David Sunderland.
Rick Cochran, who wrote the email to party members last week and is chair of the Caledonia County Republican Committee, criticized Benning and others who believe the party’s present leadership is too socially conservative — and too supportive of President Donald Trump, who is widely unpopular in Vermont.
“They want us to distance ourselves and our Party from President Trump and to turn the Party leadership over to Phil Scott,” Cochran wrote.
“Many of you have heard the same lecture from [Benning] for at least the last eight years about being centrist’s (sic). It is the same language and the same old play that hasn’t worked,” he wrote.
After the email was sent out to roughly 150 Republicans, other members of the Caledonia Republican Committee asked Cochran to step down as chair, according to a letter sent out Monday and obtained by VTDigger.
“These comments serve as a major obstacle to the Committee organizing for the 2020 elections, unnecessarily fracture relationships within the Committee, and with the Governor’s Office,” the letter said.
Rep. Scott Beck, R-St. Johnsbury, who was one of the committee members who signed the letter, said Cochran has yet to respond.
“To me at least, it’s a case where you have a county chair that is disparaging a governor from their own party and disparaging a Republican senator from Caledonia County and I don’t think that’s acceptable,” Beck said.
In an interview last week, Benning said that while he wasn’t planning a “revolt” to shake up party leadership, he did believe the party’s leadership was due for a change.
Cochran could not be reached for comment Tuesday, but in an interview last week, he said he sent out the email in part to prevent any rushed attempts to make leadership changes at upcoming party meetings, including a budget meeting scheduled for this week.
“All I’m suggesting to my peers is that this is not the time for somebody to start up a separate agenda,” he said. “If people are on their guard then they’ll kill the motion and it won’t fly.”
Beck said he wasn’t aware of plans to shake up leadership, but noted that some Republicans believe that the state party’s efforts to get behind candidates during this year’s elections were lacking.
“Everybody concerned wants to make sure that priorities for the Republican party are pursued in the state and that they’re pursued correctly and that there’s an effort made,” Beck said. “And now there’s concern that there aren’t being efforts made.”
