January 31, 2025 11:42 AM UTC

Dave Williams Disrespects Rep. Lauren Boebert In Wild Failed Rule Change Hearing

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• by: Colorado Pols

UPDATE: There’s nothing Colorado Republicans love more than fighting…Colorado Republicans.

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As Ernest Luning reports for the Colorado Springs Gazette’s political blog, embattled Colorado GOP chairman Dave Williams attempted to convene a meeting of the party’s normally pliant Central Committee to approve a set of controversial bylaw changes meant to accomplish three principal goals: reaffirming the practice begun under Williams of the party abandoning neutrality in primaries, blacklisting Republican dissidents who engineered last year’s failed coup attempt against Williams, and cutting Republican elected officials out of the committee’s votes entirely–the latter appearing to be the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back last night:

Described by proponents as long-overdue changes to align the state GOP’s governing bodies more closely with grassroots activists and volunteers, the amendments were derided by critics as a power grab that would fundamentally reshape the party by concentrating power in its officers, largely at the expense of Republican elected officials…

Many of the amendments appear to be in response to a nearly year-long dispute over party leadership that came to a head last summer, when a group of Republicans — including numerous county party officers and most of the state’s Republican elected officials — voted to remove Williams and his fellow state party officers but were rebuffed by a district court judge who ruled that Williams’ critics had failed to properly follow procedures set in the party’s bylaws.

The bylaws amendments sparked a furious backlash, including from some state Republicans who accused Williams and his allies of trying to ram the changes through just days before the party’s biennial reorganization process starts up with county party elections in the first half of February…

As we discussed last week, no one is sure about Williams’ future as at least two of his lieutenants in party leadership, Darcy Schoening and Hope Scheppleman, have expressed an interest in succeeding Williams in the event Williams gets a job with the Trump administration. Although Williams claims credit for modest gains made by Colorado Republicans in last year’s elections, his detractors argue that those gains came despite the party’s almost complete dysfunction after the primary failed to produce wins for favored candidates starting with Williams personally. On Tuesday, all four Republican members of Congress from Colorado signed a letter opposing Williams’ proposed bylaw changes that would convert them and other elected Republicans to nonvoting members and excommunicate potential opponents in the party’s upcoming leadership elections.

But as Erik Maulbetsch reports for the Colorado Times Recorder, the vote on these bylaw changes never took place. Last night’s meeting was abruptly adjourned after Williams or someone on his staff was accused of muting the microphone of dissenters, and no vote was taken other than a vote to require participants to be properly credentialed:

Williams began the meeting by taking a barely veiled shot at his own party’s congressional delegation, calling out Lauren Boebert, Jeff Crank, Gabe Evans, and Jeff Hurd (by deed if not name) for a joint public statement they issued opposing Williams’ amendments…

Williams went on to decree that only civil debate, not personal disputes, would be permitted. Purporting to model such behavior, he offered an example argument for the sixth amendment, which was the most objectionable to party leaders, as it would disenfranchise nearly all GOP elected officials from their party business voting rights. He said that this amendment had been withdrawn, but then gave an extended argument as to why federal and state elected officials didn’t deserve voting membership on the party’s Central Committee.

When Boebert broke in to ask why he was arguing for the sixth amendment already, Williams responded, “There will be no interruptions. I will not tolerate that.” [Pols emphasis]

We’re going to hazard the suggestion that it’s been some time since anyone has had the nerve to talk to Rep. Boebert like that, and she’s not likely to forget it. Even if Williams was in the process of backing down on the amendment to exclude elected officials from voting, the damage was done by this point–and without a way of organizing any votes beyond the credentialing, the meeting was over. The end result was humiliating for Williams and his would-be successors, who were counting on these changes to tilt the vote at the party leadership elections in March in their favor. Now Schoening or Scheppleman have to make their case to the full committee including their skeptics, though we would argue they’re still in contention given the narrow vote last night that stopped the bylaw changes.

It’s entirely possible that by March, Williams will be settling into his new office in Washington where his steadfast loyalty to Donald Trump is more appreciated than it is locally. That’s been the assumption for weeks as Williams’ subordinates have moved into position to run for his position, but in the aftermath of last night it’s a fair question whether Williams has alienated Colorado’s GOP congressional delegation enough to put his presumed future inside the Beltway in jeopardy.

Dave Williams has played a longshot hand from the beginning, and his own mistakes are what could leave him without even his consolation prize.