by David Jaques
Oregon’s Republican National Committeeman, Solomon Yue, has come under fire for his attempt to change the rules at the upcoming Republican National Convention, which many believe will open up the convention to the party establishment, and thwart the elected delegates.
Yue was recently re-elected to his position as National Committeeman in spite of growing opposition in the state, and an ethics investigation which ended in a call for his resignation. In the recent Oregon Republican Party’s state convention, Yue held onto his post by a vote of 61 to 46, against former Oregon Republican Chair and Christian broadcaster, Perry Atkinson.
During Yue’s tenure, Oregon has not elected a republican majority in the Oregon House or Senate since 2004, has never elected a republican to a statewide office, and never elected a new republican to congress.
Former Oregon Republican Chair, Art Robinson, said that Solomon has told him on numerous occasions; “Politics is warfare, and I am expert in Maoist tactics.” Yue then goes on to explain that in Maoist language you must “dry the grass” which he says is accomplished by starting a whisper campaign to undermine and destroy your opponent. The next step is “waiting for the wind” which Yue explains is waiting for a crisis or a scandal to brew, and then you light the fire.
Yue is on the RNC Rules Committee where he has introduced a rule change as to how the 2016 convention will be conducted. Rather than the standard procedure which is operation under U.S. House of Representative Rules, Yue favors changing to Roberts Rules of Order. His claim to delegates is this will increase transparency. But many see it as the exact opposite.
On Fox News with Shepard Smith and John Roberts, broadcast April 19, 2016, Roberts said the danger in Yue’s proposal is that “Under Roberts Rules it is possible for delegates to hold up the convention to the point where some members of the RNC are concerned that they could run out the clock until there could not be a nominee decided, which means they’d have to hold another convention where every delegate would be unbound. That is the true nightmare scenario. It happened in 1860 for the democrats.”
Morton Blackwell, Republican National Committeeman from Virginia said that Roberts Rules was never intended to run something on the scale of a national convention. “They weren’t designed for a group this large, but for a maximum of 100-150 people”. Blackwell, who has been to every Republican Convention since Barry Goldwater, said “this is not the time to change our rules.”
According to Oregon’s Republican National Committeewoman elect Marylin Shannon, Solomon told Oregon delegates that switching to Roberts Rules would make this convention more transparent; he failed to mention the use of stalling tactics that are available under Roberts Rules. Shannon says this would only help the establishment’s candidate. She called the proposed rule change more like a “bait and switch” maneuver.
According to an article in Politico, April 19, 2016, Yue has even taken on RNC Chairman Reince Priebus, who he claims pressured him to withdraw his proposed rule change. In that column Priebus is quoted as saying on CNN “I don’t think that it’s a good idea for us next week, I mean, before the convention to make serious rules changes or recommendations of changes right now.”
Shannon agrees. She said “this is the worst possible timing for a thing like this, when what we should be doing is unifying going into the convention.”