Michael Steele seeks second term, surprising GOP insiders

Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele launched a fight to keep his job Monday, stunning many in the party who had expected him to step aside.

His decision means Republicans will be debating the record of its first African American chairman next month just as the new GOP-controlled House is being sworn in. Steele and Republican congressional leaders have been at odds in the past and a bruising internecine fight could become an unwelcome distraction.

Near the close of a sometimes-rambling 33-minute speech, delivered to the Republican National Committee via conference call Monday night, Steele asked members to give him a second term “because I really believe in my heart that our work is not done.”

He faces an uphill fight to keep his job, according to party veterans, including some who say they like him personally but doubt he can win. His decision sets up a battle with half a dozen rivals who thus far have soft-pedaled their criticism of Steele’s record ahead of a mid-January vote.

“The debate is going to get sharper,” said Colorado Republican Party Chairman Dick Wadhams. “Now it’s clearly going to be a referendum on the Steele term.”

Steele spoke to that concern in his phone call with RNC members, saying that “the worst thing we can do right now is to look backward.” At the same time, he insisted that he had “made no excuses,” “told no lies” and “hidden no agendas” despite being honest “sometimes to a bloody fault,” apparently referring to his penchant for self-inflicted damage.

His decision to run was reported by Fox News several hours before the conference call, and the development spread quickly through party circles.

Many Republicans had been expecting Steele to step down, in part because a concerted backstage campaign appeared to have undermined his standing with members of the committee. Those ready to replace Steele say the RNC needs a low-key manager to get the party machinery back on track, not a “Fox chairman” eager to leap onto cable TV shows as a national spokesman.

The anti-Steele message — that the party needs more energetic and efficient leadership — has become a theme of those competing for his job. Two of the challengers worked closely with Steele over the last two years and are highly critical of his leadership.

When he won the chairmanship in 2009, Steele, a former Fox News commentator and Maryland lieutenant governor, represented a change that even party insiders wanted after eight years of George W. Bush.

Running as an outsider, he was elected days after President Obama took office. Supporters saw him as a charismatic speaker who could give the party a new, more diverse image. But perceptions of Steele as an articulate messenger proved mistaken, as he stumbled into a series of verbal gaffes that never really ended.

Last summer, his description of the conflict in Afghanistan as “a war of Obama’s choosing” horrified Republicans who backed the effort and remembered its origins under Bush. And he suggested last winter that Republicans would not succeed in taking over the House, a view that left many in the GOP fuming, especially after the party’s victories in November.

Management problems at party headquarters in Washington also drew increasing, and unwanted, attention. Steele’s chief of staff and another aide were dismissed after nearly $2,000 in RNC money was spent at a sex-themed West Hollywood nightclub. A falloff in contributions from big donors gave critics another target.

Elections for party chairman are insider games. Power belongs to the three RNC members from each of the 50 states, the District of Columbia and five U.S. territories, and personal considerations can easily trump broader calculations.

Anti-Steele forces, including officials with close ties to prominent Republicans such as former Vice President Dick Cheney, strategist Karl Rove and Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, are backing several challengers. Among them are RNC officials from Bush’s administration, two current RNC members and the party’s former political director, who quit last month with a blast at Steele’s leadership.

paul.west@latimes.com