Confusion Reigns over Hidden NRCC Membership List

In response to my column yesterday about the Nevada Republican Central Committee (NRCC) keeping its membership list hidden from the public, I received this email from longtime GOP activist/member Rob Tyree…

“Any member of the committee can request a list of the other members, including Dave McKeon or Annie Black. They have just as much access as the incumbents.”

Whether or not that’s so is something I’ll get to in a minute.  But even if true, that wasn’t my point.

I’m a registered Republican, but I’m not a member of the NRCC.  And the members of the NRCC are making decisions on my behalf as a registered Republican.

Yet I have absolutely no idea whatsoever who these people are!

That’s just not right.  The NRCC membership list should be publicly disclosed and the names should be posted on the party’s website.  Period.

Now let’s get back to Mr. Tyree’s response that “Any member of the committee can request a list of the other members, including Dave McKeon or Annie Black.”

Both McKeon and Black are running for party chairman against longtime incumbent Chairman Michael McDonald.

And according to an email I received last night from Black, she’s requested a copy of the membership list from the party chairman and the party secretary THREE TIMES already…with no response.

So, she advises, she sent another email to Chairman McDonald last night asking for a copy of the membership list.  And here’s the response she says she received this morning…

“Good morning Anne, I do not have that information. That request would be made to the secretary which I see you copied on this email.”

Look, I’ve been a longtime supporter of Chairman McDonald.  But that response simply doesn’t fly.

We’re supposed to believe the chairman of the party “does not have” the membership list?  Or couldn’t get it with the snap of his fingers if he wanted to?

Come on.  I may have been born at night but it wasn’t LAST night!

That said, it does stand to reason that the keeper of the list would be the party secretary.  Fine.

But if the party secretary isn’t releasing the membership list to candidates for party offices – including, by the way, the office of secretary – that ain’t right and the chairman needs to step in and MAKE it happen.

It’s bad enough that the NRCC’s membership list isn’t provided to Nevada’s registered Republicans.

But to keep that list hidden from the candidates running to represent us lowly GOP voters on the party’s official governing board stinks like yesterday’s diapers.

It’s time to end the cover-up.  Come out from the shadows, NRCC.  Release the names.