As evidence mounts that beleaguered Colorado GOP Chair Dave Williams used Party funds to help finance his own 5th Congressional District campaign and his Vice Chair Hope Scheppelman defends him, the two claim those trying to take them down are “RINOs, Establishment and UniParty” traitors and anoint themselves the sacred “grassroots.” But they’ve managed to flip the script; they themselves are now the RINOs.

What defines a Republican in Name Only – the much-loathed RINO? A RINO is someone who purports to be a Republican but who refuses to support or even actively opposes fellow Republican candidates.

That’s just what Williams has managed to do since he was elected last year. He led the Party to fulfill one of his most ardent “grassroots” campaign promises: overturning traditional pre-primary neutrality in favor of unprecedented new bylaws that let the state and county parties endorse or oppose Republican candidates before the primary. He spent some $60,000 of Party donor funds on four or five mailers promoting his own congressional run and attacking rival Jeff Crank as a pro-amnesty, open border RINO.

A thumb on the scale

The “Paid for by the Colorado Republican Committee” line on his  mailers gave Williams a Republican voter boost over his CD5 rivals, and implied the Party endorsement. Using the Party’s much cheaper bulk mail permit rate for his campaign ads gave him another significant unfair advantage over the other candidates.

But according to a Republican official familiar with campaign finance rules, Williams could be risking a charge of mail fraud because he pirated the Party’s nonprofit mailing permit.

Williams also used Republican funds for a mailer attacking State Rep. Gabe Evans just before the 8th Congressional District primary, which Evans won with 77% of the vote.

The colorful, oversized mailer unleashed a barrage of accusations against Evans, including that he’d been “running away from Trump.” A pretty silly charge since Rep. Evans was endorsed by the former president. Says Evans, “the funniest charge to me is being accused of not voting against Prop HH which would have increased property taxes. Not a single House Republican voted because the Dems refused to let us debate it or offer amendments, so we all walked out.”

None of these expenditures was approved by the Colorado GOP’s 25-member executive committee. Williams’ serial violation of Ronald Reagan’s commandment never to speak ill of fellow Republicans didn’t go well; of the 18 primary races in which the Party endorsed favorites, only four of their favorites won.

Those the Party failed to endorse aren’t sure they can trust Chair Williams to support them with financial help now that they are the general election nominees.

When Republicans and the media began noticing he was using Party funds to pay for ads to win his own primary campaign, Williams hastened to “reimburse” the Party $60,000 on June 14, just before the June 25 primary. But campaign finance laws may not allow this payment. And his FEC Schedule B Form 3 showed the payment as reimbursement for the general election, which it isn’t since Williams was thoroughly thrashed by 30 points in the primary by Crank who will be the Republican nominee in the general.

Revolt of the county chairs

Some members of the State Central Committee (SCC), led by El Paso County Vice Chair Todd Watkins and Jefferson County Party Chair Nancy Pallozzi, were sick of Williams’ shenanigans. They collected and submitted the names of one-quarter of the 425-member Central Committee and requested a special meeting to vote on ousting Williams. When Williams flaunted the bylaws (Article VII, D3, and Article V, Section C) by ignoring their request, Watkins called the meeting for July 27.

Immediately, Vice Chair Scheppelman launched a full-scale intimidation and character assassination assault.  She called Watkins a traitor and declared the July 27 Central Committee meeting he set fraudulent and illegal (which it isn’t). At the same time Scheppelman followed the same 30-day meeting requirement in the bylaws by setting a competing meeting for July 19. Curiously, she planned to call the meeting to order and then immediately recess it. Her meeting mocked the rules instead of following them. Nobody would come to a non-meeting in the far south, tiny  community of Bayfield where the Vice Chair lives.

Then in the first week of July, Scheppelman besieged the church where Watkins had scheduled the 7/27 meeting with multiple threatening phone calls. Ramping up the intimidation, she emailed the church a treatise from a law firm titled, “What Political Activities by Churches Can Jeopardize 501(c) (3) Status With the IRS.” Had she forgotten the State GOP also holds its own large meetings at churches, the last one at the Rock Church in Castle Rock on 9/30/23?

As Williams went into duck and cover mode, Scheppelman took the lead. She and other officers of the palace guard convened a tribunal to deal with upstarts Watkins and Pallozzi. The 25-member State Executive Committee – made up overwhelmingly of Williams loyalists – held a hearing that became an orgy of nit-pickery focused on the names that had been submitted and whether or not the bylaws were actually the bylaws.

In the end, they declared the upcoming insurrectionist meeting “improper and illegal” and told the SCC members to ignore Watkins’ meeting notice “as any business conducted will be illegitimate.” Further, “we will soon execute plans with Party attorneys to take the next necessary legal steps to stop Mr. Watkins’ fraud and abuse.” Scheppelman signed the verdict and also cancelled the fraudulent meeting she had called for 7/19. Perhaps she had discovered that Eagle Park where she had set her bogus meeting in faraway Bayfield (near Durango), had already been booked?

Todd Watkins just laughs because the Executive Committee decision has no actual authority, and the courts have shown zero interest in adjudicating such disputes, telling the political parties to sort out differences by themselves.

High drama

The suspense builds as SCC members receive Watkins’ notice of the 7/27 meeting in their mailboxes, as required by the bylaws. Will Williams be deposed? Will the State Party file an injunction against Watkins? Will the meeting come off without a hitch?

Chairman Wiliams is no stranger to problems about his integrity. In 2020 he was fired from his volunteer position on President Trump’s campaign for abusing his title, according to regional director, Brian Seitchick. “He has no interest in anything other than his own personal gain,” said Seitchick. “If he has to burn the state Party down to get ahead, he’ll do it. If he has to cost us winnable races to further his own career, he will do so.”

Some are convinced Williams will refuse to leave office even if he is voted out, since the meeting has been declared illegal. Then the RNC will likely step in to declare the rightful Party leader, as they did recently in Michigan when the GOP Chair wouldn’t accept her State Party’s vote firing her.

Whatever happens, the Party officers’ Mafia-esque bully tactics, violating their own bylaws, and vilifying good Republican candidates have transformed them into the establishment RINOs they despise. Now the underdog freedom warriors – the true grassroots – are the brave rebels led by Todd Watkins and Nancy Pallozzi.

Joy Overbeck is a Colorado journalist and Douglas County Republican Precinct Leader whose work has appeared at Complete Colorado, Townhall.com, Rocky Mountain Voice, American Thinker, The Washington Times, The Federalist and elsewhere. Follow her on Facebook and on Twitter (X) @joyoverbeck1