“It’s not over ’til it’s over, but we’re pretty close,” Hoekstra said in an interview Thursday. “When you have the state committee having made a decision, when you have that decision affirmed by the RNC and when the president has said, ‘This is the guy that I want to work with to win Michigan’ – in normal times, that would be an overwhelming case for this to be over.”
Since taking over about a year ago, Karamo has upended the Republican Party in a state pivotal for both parties in 2024 presidential election. President Biden narrowly won Michigan in 2020, while Trump carried it four years earlier.
A Fox News poll released Wednesday found the two are nearly tied in Michigan in their likely rematch this year.
Trump is heading to the state for a rally Saturday in the Detroit area. Hoekstra said he will attend and expects the former president to reiterate his support.
The RNC executive committee unanimously approved Hoekstra as an RNC member and Michigan GOP chair Wednesday, according to the national party. The decision came after its committee on contests ruled that Karamo was properly removed from the state party post last month when her critics called a special meeting and many present supported her ouster.
In a nine-page report obtained by The Washington Post, the RNC contests committee sided with Hoekstra in four areas of dispute, including whether the special meeting was properly called.
Karamo did not respond to a request for comment on the RNC decision, but in a video posted Wednesday night on social media, she continued to claim to be at the helm of the party.
“Ronna McDaniel admitted to me that I’m still legally the chair of the Michigan Republican Party and the RNC has no authority to override the precinct delegates or the state central committee,” Karamo said in the video.
McDaniel, the RNC chairwoman, is from Michigan herself and led the state party there from 2015 to 2017.
Karamo was first elected to the post in February 2023. She won it after a double-digit loss in the 2022 election for Michigan secretary of state — a race she refused to concede. She previously ascended to prominence for making substantiated claims of fraud in the 2020 presidential election and earned Trump’s backing in her campaign for secretary of state.
Her time as state GOP chair has been marred by physical confrontations at party meetings, fundraising struggles and a battle over ownership of the party headquarters.
Hoekstra, who served as U.S. ambassador to the Netherlands under Trump, said he has already started the work of moving the state party forward. He has scheduled two “significant” fundraisers for the party later this month, met with third-party political groups that sprung up during Karamo’s tenure and contacted social media companies to get control of the party’s accounts.
As for Karamo and her supporters, he said he welcomes their participation in the party going forward. He added he has not heard from Karamo since the RNC ruling.
He acknowledged the state party cannot afford further turmoil this year.
“We’ve got eight months to do what we normally have 18 months to do,” Hoekstra said.
The presidential race is not the only high-profile contest where Michigan Republicans are striving for unity this year. They are also hoping to capture the Senate seat being vacated by retiring Democrat Debbie Stabenow.
“The entire RNC membership and staff is ready to work with everyone, regardless of title, in Michigan who is interested in electing DJT, our presumptive nominee, and putting Republicans in the open Michigan U.S. Senate and House seats,” Rob Steele, an RNC member from Michigan, wrote in an email.
Democrats suggested the GOP leadership change does not change their posture ahead of November.
“It doesn’t matter if Pete Hoekstra or Kristina Karamo is chair, the party is a radical, far-right engine of chaos, no matter who heads it,” the state Democratic Party chair, Lavora Barnes, said in a statement.
Patrick Marley contributed to this story.
