One of the signs placed to discredit Clark County Republican Party Chair David Gellatly sits on the side of the road. Gellatly has been under fire for alleged mismanagement, which he says is an attack by “extremists” within the party.
Not everyone is happy with Clark County’s Republican Party chairman, and now that political discord has spilled onto the sides of the road.
Earlier this month, The Reflector received reports that signs challenging the current GOP chairman David Gellatly on his leadership had gone up in the county. What’s more, a reader had submitted claims that some of those signs were removed, with the reader stating they were removed illegally under a Washington state statute regarding political signs.
The appearance of the signs followed a failed vote to have Gellatly removed as chairman. The vote was 7-4 in favor, but it required a supermajority to pass.
Backlash against Gellatly has become heated in the months following his placement as county party chairman in December. Some of the most prominent sites of discontent are several Facebook pages with names ranging from simply “Remove Gellatly” to “The Blind Onions,” which criticizes other members of the county party board.
Apart from the Facebook pages, a website, removegellatly.com, has been created, citing more than a dozen alleged offenses that the party chairman has made, including the alleged misuse of party funds, issues regarding the invitation of conservative pundit Tomi Lahren at the party’s annual Lincoln Day Dinner as well as “adolescent” behavior “on multiple social media venues.” The sites link to a page with apparent screenshots of alleged evidence.
An open letter from an anonymous source was sent to multiple media outlets claiming the removal of the signs as the latest offense that Gellatly and his “handlers,” as the letter calls them, have committed.
That letter brought a response from one of the GOP’s precinct committee officers. Carol Brown decried the anonymously-submitted document as being unnecessarily incendiary.
“I feel that both David and the Board deserve to have their sides of this, heard,” Brown wrote, adding that she thought the letter was only going to give more “fodder” for media outlets to use to disparage the county party.
Gellatly spoke with The Reflector to address the accusations, many of which he felt were essentially attempts to remove him from his position.
“Nobody is upset because of those allegations; they are trying to find things that they can draw attention to that they think will stick,” Gellatly said.
At the outset, when he was first nominated, Gellatly said that feelings were good within the party. When he felt pressure to attack members of the party who some thought were against its goals, things started to turn.
On the use of the term “extremists,” Gellatly said it was pretty clear as to who he was referring to.
“Anybody that disagrees with them on a single issue should not be allowed to be called a Republican,” Gellatly explained, adding that the disruption they cause is directly in opposition to the goal of the party, which is to elect Republicans to office.
“That is not the ‘big-tent’ Republican Party that Reagan stood for, and not the one that I want to be a part of,” Gellatly said.
Regarding the open letter, Gellatly said that there have been a few instances where similar screeds were issued, adding that he didn’t feel the claims are newsworthy.
“It’s certainly not something that the majority of the party appreciates or reflects (onto) them,” Gellatly said.
Gellatly also addressed the “dilatory” moniker, an epithet used by the anonymous letter-writer and a term featured prominently on protest signs. He explained that in Robert’s Rules of Order, an agreed-upon set of structure for parliamentary discussion to follow, something dilatory was frivolous and obstructive, something he saw happen time and again in the infighting.
“This is personal agendas and extremism. This isn’t healthy for our community in any way, shape or form,” Gellatly said.
