Former RNC Chairman Michael Whatley Endorsed Thom Tillis at a March Fundraiser in Raleigh.
The influence of top-down central planning by the Republican National Committee (RNC) has trickled into North Carolina’s state party politics, culminating in a growing internal conflict regarding the nomination process for the United States Senate seat soon to be vacated by Thom Tillis.
In an unexpected strategy shift, the RNC, until recently led by former North Carolina GOP Chairman Michael Whatley, allocated financial backing to Whatley as he runs for an open, key Senate seat in North Carolina, a move highlighted by NBC News.
Whatley appears to require this support, as he trails Cooper in polls and struggles to rally Republicans behind a candidate perceived as an establishment insider. The polls reflect this challenge. A recent Emerson College survey shows Whatley lagging behind Cooper by 8 points.
Conservative leaders within the Republican Party of North Carolina are fighting back.
Critics compare these tactics to Soviet-era central planning methods reminiscent of Stalin and Lenin. Some party members are calling for the leadership to face consequences, seeing them as acting independently from the party’s grassroots.
Until recently, the Soviet-style takeover of the NC GOP has received little coverage, with the exception of one major political blog.
The Daily Haymaker, a prominent political website in North Carolina, has been at the forefront of reporting on what they describe as a heavy-handed, Central Committee-style party intervention.
Whatley entered the Senate race after Lara Trump indicated her intent to steer clear of politics to focus on family life, stepping in to potentially succeed Tillis amid his controversies.
Whatley’s decision to run for his boss Tillis’s seat came mere months after Whatley himself endorsed Thom Tillis for office.
At a March 21st Raleigh fundraiser held at the Carolina Country Club, Whatley, then the Chairman of the Republican National Committee, endorsed Thom Tillis in his run for re-election to the U.S. Senate.
National File has spoken with several attendees of the fundraiser, each of whom declined to speak on the record for fear of retribution by Party apparatchiks in the NC GOP.
“I was there, and I am friends with several other people who were there. I can’t go on the record because the Party will retaliate against me for speaking publicly about party officials endorsing incumbents,” one attendee told me.
The attendee continued on: “No one who was in that room will go on record either, because the party is their club.”
Another attendee who spoke by way of text confirmed that Whatley endorsed Tillis. “I was there, I know,” the attendee told National File via text.
Other leaders within the North Carolina Republican Party (NC GOP), along with a growing cadre of grassroots activists, are going public against the centralization of control, calling the takeover Soviet in nature.
These conservative leaders are circulating a “Petition for a Disciplinary Hearing” targeting the state party’s three top leaders: state chairman Jason Simmons, and RNC committee members Ed Broyhill and Kyssia Brassington.
Their beef stems from Party leaders’ clear violation of its own set of bylaws, known as the “Plan of Organization.”
Page 39 of the NC GOP’s Plan of Organization, makes it clear that party officers “shall refrain from utilizing the powers and dignity of his office or position in any Republican primary or public office at any level.”
Rule IX F of the NC GOP’s Plan of Organization, ironically shortened to ‘POO,’ reads as follows:
REFRAIN FROMUTILIZING POWERS OF OFFICE IN REPUBLICAN PRIMARY Each officer and each member of any Committee created pursuant to this Plan of Organization shall refrain from utilizing the powers and dignity of his office or position in any Republican primary for public office at any level. Nor shall any Committee created pursuant to this Plan of Organization make or issue, in any way, manner or form, any endorsement in any Republican primary for public office. Nor shall any Committee issue any contrary endorsement or withhold support from any non-partisan judicial candidates properly endorsed pursuant to this Plan of Organization.
The RNC has a similar rule, which says, “The Republican National Committee shall not … contribute money or in-kind aid to any candidate for any public or party office of that state, except the nominee of the Republican Party or a candidate who is unopposed in the Republican primary after the filing deadline for that office.”
And while the state party rule does not allow room to wiggle, the national level rules are far sneakier.
In a very used-car-salesman-like twist, the RNC gave themselves an exception. If the hand-selected party apparatchiks who hold the three seats on the National Committee unanimously decide to screw over the Republican voters in any state, then the RNC can pick the nominee by exercising outsize financial influence on the party primary process.
And that is exactly what happened in the case of Michael Whatley.
RNC National Committeewoman Kyshia Brassington and National Committeeman Ed Broyhill have evidently decided to forego any semblance of a primary process in favor of DC party elites coronating Whatley.
Far Left Liberal NBC News was quick to assist North Carolina’s RNC Committee members in their subterfuge.
So while the same spirit holds in the rules of the Republican National Committee, the RNC has given themselves permission to screw over the grassroots.
At a September 20 NC GOP Central Committee meeting in Raleigh, Kyshia Brassington told the committee that the party needs to “focus on winning.”
Kyshia, who was re-elected to her role as National Committeewoman in 2024, also has a habit of posting photos of herself posing in revealing lingerie, making ‘come hither’ bedroom eyes for the camera while sipping Veuve Cliquot Brut, or sucking on a lollipop.
Brassington runs a preschool in Huntersville calling itself “Community Preschool of Huntersville.”
Despite, or perhaps because of Kyshia’s odd habit of posing for mid-life Glamour Shots, Brassington decided Republican voters do not deserve a say in the nomination process for the Republican Party in North Carolina, and exercised her option to bring in big money behind Whatley.
The RNC’s rule 11 reads as follows:
RULE NO. 11 Candidate Support (a) The Republican National Committee shall not, without the prior written and filed approval of all members of the Republican National Committee from the state involved, contribute money or in-kind aid to any candidate for any public or party office of that state, except the nominee of the Republican Party or a candidate who is unopposed in the Republican primary after the filing deadline for that office. In those states where state law establishes a non-partisan primary in which Republican candidates could participate, but in which the general election may not include a Republican candidate, the candidate endorsed by a convention held under the authority of the state Republican Party shall be recognized by the Republican National Committee as the Republican nominee. (b) No state Republican Party rule or state law shall be observed that allows persons who have participated or are participating in the selection of any nominee of a party other than the Republican Party, including, but not limited to, through the use of a multi- party primary or similar type ballot, to participate in the selection of a nominee of the Republican Party for that general election. No person nominated in violation of this rule shall be recognized by the Republican National Committee as the nominee of the Republican Party from that state.
Thom Tillis, who has famously tanked Trump nominee Ed Martin in May, announced at the end of June that he didn’t want to run for his senate seat again in 2026.
That was little surprise, given Trump won a second term, and Tillis has been working against Trump every step of the way, on seemingly every issue.
Tillis faced a censure for his vote for the Respect for Marriage Act, which protected gay marriage.
“When Thom Tillis voted for same-sex “marriage,” he violated the NCGOP Platform and severely damaged the credibility of the party,” Isaac Burke, an NCGOP executive Precinct Leader, said.
Tillis also advocated for an increase in Indian tech workers in the country, and should automatically give citizenship to foreign students who graduate from American colleges and universities.
Conservatives in the NC GOP have been on the warpath of late against Brassington and Broyhill supported State Senator Phil Berger, charging him with party disloyalty for backing Democrats in certain situations and for working against key industries in North Carolina like its fishermen.
Tillis has also pushed strongly against President Trump on the issue of January 6th support, which he cited as his reason for opposing Trump’s nominee to head up the US Attorney’s Office in D.C.
Whatley’s opponent, Don Brown, on the other hand, has vocally opposed the illegal and legal immigrant takeover of the American labor market.
Brown recently opposed the Party Brass’s attacks on one of North Carolina’s key industries. Brown announced his “America First Shrimp Act” to protect domestic producers from dumping by the likes of China and India, which unfairly impacts American fishermen.
Brown has also fought on behalf of Trump by advocating for those who were politically persecuted by the Biden regime after January 6th, 2021.
The stark contrast in support for Trump by the grassroots and opposition to Trump by Party leaders in North Carolina could not be more stark, and battle lines are being drawn. General Michael Flynn has endorsed Brown’s candidacy for example.
The political move by the RNC to back Whatley is properly viewed as a tightening of the noose around the necks of Americans by well-funded global interests who contribute large sums of cash to both state and federal politicians.
The same globalist interests run policy in Raleigh and the District of Columbia, and Whatley, steeped in both, has remained silent on efforts by conservatives to hold those accountable who would sell out North Carolina’s workers.
The situation Broyhill, Simmons, and Brassington waded into with the Party’s endorsement in the Senate race is one that is full of landmines.
After TIllis’s decision to give up on North Carolina, which frees him up to openly oppose Trump for another year and a half, a month of furious political jockeying took place, both within North Carolina and nationally.
Many Republicans wanted Lara Trump to announce for the seat, since she seemed to most to be the candidate most likely to defeat long-time Tarheel Democrat institution Roy Cooper. Trump, who grew up in Wilmington, NC, ultimately decided not to run.
Then, about a month later, Whatley, evidently after securing guarantees from his friends the Romneys and the Bush-era operatives who still run the Republican National Committee, Whatley decided he wanted to run. [https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2025/07/31/congress/whatley-launches-senate-bid-00487323]
Despite these rules against interfering in party primaries, the GOP decided to go all in on funding Whatley’s candidacy, despite the fact that the primary is an open primary.
The grassroots are not happy, as The Daily Haymaker reports.
Sherry-Lynn Womack, a GOP leader in Lee County, has the following to say:
“Strengthening Democracy Starts at the Grassroots.
What we’re seeing in North Carolina politics right now should trouble every citizen who cares about freedom and accountability. Decisions that impact all of us are not being made in our communities, by the people who know them best. Instead, they are being dictated from the top down by a handful of insiders. When party bosses hoard power at the top, it stops being leadership and starts looking like dictatorship. That’s not grassroots governance — that’s control.
This top-down style of politics is exactly what Stalin and Lenin’s Soviet Central Committee was infamous for: a tiny circle of elites making every decision, while the voices of ordinary people were ignored. It was rigid, authoritarian, and it smothered initiative. While North Carolina isn’t the Soviet Union, the comparison drives home an important truth — when power is concentrated in the hands of a few, the people are always the ones who lose.
Our state deserves better. North Carolina thrives when leaders listen to their citizens, trust their local communities, and value transparency over control. True leadership empowers local voices; it never silences them. The grassroots — the people who live here, work here, and raise their families here — are the foundation of our democracy. If we want a strong state and a strong future, we must make sure their voices are not only heard, but respected. Power belongs to the people of North Carolina. And that’s exactly where it should stay!”
The Haymaker’s report continues:
We told you about the announcement by the Republican National Committee that they would be making the unusual, historic move of meddling in a contested primary election for North Carolina’s soon-to-be-vacant US Senate seat. Career party hack Michael Whatley – the favorite of DC, Raleigh, and Thom Tillis – will face at least one Republican opponent, Charlotte-area attorney Don Brown, in the March primary.
The two major parties have long been governed by rules forbidding party leaders to take sides in primary elections.
Whatley has shown lackluster levels of excitement among the grassroots Republicans in North Carolina since his announcement nearly two months ago.
It remains to be seen whether the party faithful will accept Whatley and his big money backers, or whether they’ll demand a more forthright party nomination process.
