May 15, 2024 • 12 mins
They didn't endorse any incumbents ahead of the Republican primary. Each of them won, handily. How does the leader of the state GOP assess the results? We asked him.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Eighty percent support for Fisher and Ricketts, eighty percent for Flood, only sixty
percent for Bacon. We've talked alot about that, but when it comes
to the picks from the State RepublicanParty, for example, they said,
don't vote for Pete Ricketts instead,John Glenn Weaver should get your vote.
(00:20):
Well, John Glenn Weaver at lastcheck now has not quite fifteen percent support
in that Senate race. Dan Fryefared much better, but still fell short
of Don Bacon, and I Idon't know how much more bluntly I can
put it than this guy on xnamed Sam posted this yesterday last night,
(00:45):
saying anxiously awaiting a statement from theNebraska GOP of how proud they are of
their endorsed candidates. Pathetic and fecklessmiscalculation in my day would have cost my
chairman's job and the entire staff's job. But back in those days we had
expectations. How things change. That'sfrom Sam Fisher on Twitter X. So
(01:07):
we welcome now the chair of theNebraska Republican Party. Eric Underwood joins us
here on news radio eleven ten KFA. Be a pretty blunt assessment there,
Eric, how are you feeling today, I'm actually feeling pretty rested. I
feel pretty good with the fact thatthere are results out of that, as
you started to indicate of how manyRepublicans came across the finish line. And
(01:30):
to be honest, since we arethe state party, it's not something that
I'm so focused on one set ofraces over the other. So when you
look at everything from Board of Educationdown to legislative I feel very good with
where we're at as far as havingrepresentatives in the November elections, which is
part of the primary purpose. Well, one big thing that people look at
(01:51):
here is Nebraska's second district. Asyou know, the state Republican Party did
not endorse the incumbent Don Bacon.Challenger Dan Fry lost and as of this
morning when I talked to Dan,he and Don Bacon haven't talked. Don't
know if there be any reconciliation.I'm not sure what that means in terms
of support for November from Fry supporters, but kind of sounds like these are
(02:15):
your people as well. Will youendorse Don Bacon in his race this November
against Democrat Tony Vargas well. Theobjectives of the party and the constitutional requirements
are not going to change because ofthe primary. I would lose my integrity,
my character if I did that.The endorsement process is the conversation that
happens with the Central Committee, andyou know that it's been in reference before.
(02:38):
It's and a thousand other emails aboutthat. The Central Committee is one
hundred and sixty six people and ninetypercent of them attended the meeting that Dan
Fry and the many of the others, including Legislative District Ripson, his Board
of Education individuals were endorsed. SoI think it's fair to say if all
of a sudden, we just changeall the rules and just go, you
know what, they don't have toask for endorsements and we don't have to
(02:59):
go through the process. It's justunilateral decision making. And at what point
is there even a purpose of aparty of growing. And it's the same
thing when it comes to the RNCall the way to the national level.
They could have just said, youknow what, we're all supporting President Trump.
But they went through a process,and this is a process. It
also is something that does give reflection. I'm not going to deny that.
I think that we do have tohave a reflection on where and how a
(03:22):
party and a county party can beeffective in races, and what we can
do to make sure that when thegrowth happened, such as it did this
year, we doubled the amount ofcounty delegates, so we went through two
thousands to four thousand county delegates.When that growth happens, what can we
do within what opportunities do we haveto facilitate the constitutional objectives of the party,
(03:43):
and those constitutional objectives are objective,not subjective. We're here to further
our principles and we're here to maintainthe government of buying for the people and
tell that changes in the constitution.I'm not sure what to do differently,
but i think the greater story thatalso comes out of this is a level
of engagement that occurred as well,the amount of doors and interactions on all
(04:04):
campaigns here, both Democrat and Republicanhad a very low voter turnout this year.
Three hundred and thirty and thirty threethousand people showed up in twenty twenty
four. Now twenty twenty almost fivehundred thousand showed up, But back in
twenty sixteen it was three hundred andthirteen thousand and two hundred and twelve or
twenty twelve it was two hundred ninetyseven thousand. So is there something that
(04:26):
we as a party. I mean, both sides can look at it this
way, but we as the partyneed to be doing differently to engage the
voters the electorate to be involved,and specifically in my conversations with the Trump
team, which is President Trump's teamwhich is now integrated in the RNC,
there's a concern of the amount ofvotes that were attributed to him versus others.
This is something that they're seen andthat's a national level view, but
(04:47):
that the level of engagement is somethingthat we're going to he wants to effectively
focus on. It's getting out thevote to ensure that we win Congressional District
two. That those are the conversationsthat I want to move forward to.
What does Don Beacon need to doto get the support of the forty or
so percent that didn't support him duringyesterday's primary. Well, I have asked
(05:11):
from all elected officials and many ofthem have been a part of it to
build a relationship with the state partyand neither remind you that we worked with
Congressman Bacon in the twenty twenty tworace. We facilitated fifteen mailers through all
through that sit paid for by theNebraska Republican Party, facilitated the TV programs
that happened with it, and inearly twenty twenty three I invited him to
(05:32):
the Chairman's Retreat where he got tomeet all of the county chairs throughout a
party. This is this personality divide, not a value divide, at least
for the most part. The personalitydivide is whether or not we have the
opportunity to have relationships. And Ithink that's what majority of the Congressional of
the Central Committee, that one hundredand sixty six members, they would like.
(05:54):
They would like the opportunity they haverelationships with the elected officials, whether
it's the governor down to board representative. So that way our principles can be
furthered and we can help in twentytwenty three when we did in twenty twenty
three, when we interacted with mostof the legislative body, that's when the
electorate showed up. They went tothe Unit Caramel and they showed up in
(06:15):
force to all of those Subcommittee Aheringsfour hundred to five hundred people on everything
that was needed. Well, thatdoesn't happen overnight, and it doesn't happen
just by happenstance. There was anetwork that was created, a structure,
a communication network, so that waywhen a bill was brought up and they
needed support, the state Party organizedthem through all of our coalitions and said
(06:36):
let's go and support. That happenedin twenty twenty three. This has been
breaking down a little bit over time. My goal is to reinvigorate those relationships.
My assessment, which is worth asmuch as you're paying for it here
as we're talking with Eric Underwood,chairperson of the Nebraska Republican Party, my
(06:57):
assessment is that the former leadership ofthe state Republican Party, who I think
you could call someone like Pete Rickettsa leader of that former leadership of the
party, I think that they werevery wrong to ignore the more maga wing
of the Republican Party, that theyshut them down in state leadership roles that
(07:18):
sometimes they weren't heard. This goesall the way back to the Ron Paul
days and that kind of feeling likeyou're being ignored. People don't like that,
and you guys showed up in twentytwenty two and organized ready to go,
and the leadership changed. But myconcern here with the new leadership is
that it seems like too many ofthese really extreme right wing members of the
(07:45):
State Republican Party do have an allor nothing approach when it comes to a
candidate. We might agree on nineout of ten things, but if I
don't like your vote on that tenthing, you're out of here. We
might as well get a Democrat inthere, because they're no better than you.
And if these two sides don't cometogether, I think it's gonna be
(08:05):
hard for someone like Don Bacon towin this race in Nebraska's second district this
November. But let's take a lookhere at your assessment that Pete Ricketts was
not deserving of being elected here inthis case of what we re elected in
the Senate seat where he was appointed, and now we were doing this that
(08:26):
you thought the John Glenn Weaver wasa better candidate than Pete Ricketts. So
the people spoke and Ricketts got eightypercent support. Are they out of touch
with you or are you out oftouch with them? Well, you know,
Idin I think it speaks back towhether or not there's a relationship established
before the convention that happened in twentytwenty two. I sat down with Governor
(08:48):
Ricketts at the time, Governor andI said, this is going to be
a very impassionate convention here, butwe have a chance to harness this energy.
And that was the relationship that Iwanted to build with him. I
have continued to reach out. Icontinue to reach out to our governor.
I've made the overtures and I've gotit all documented of the times to build
out here. And if you lookat the federal though, let's be very
honest, this is something that peopleneed to understand. The federal candidates have
(09:09):
never used the state party as anapparatus to get elected. Congress important very
very little use that. Senator Statsdidn't use that. Congressman Smith hasn't Congress
and Bacon did use us in twentytwenty two, and Senator Fisher doesn't use
him that much. So as faras mailing or endorsements or request, sure
(09:30):
they might get the endorsement, butnothing else is facilitated through them other than
using maybe walkbook gaps and stuff likethat. So then again you ask yourself,
then what is the purpose of astate party and its relationship at the
federal level or even the governor's level. We do have an opportunity and it
was in our political plan to developthe county parties and we have exceeded that
exquications. That means that the goalinen of helping the Board of Education races
(09:54):
and the school board races. That'sthe secondary part of our political plan.
This is what we want to moveinto, is to go into the local
races and see where we can help, where you can win or lose by
fifty votes versus fifty thousand. Iwill do everything I can to be build
a bridge, stand on the bridge. But I think that the central Committee
and the individuals that are going tobe a part of moving this forward,
(10:16):
the leaders are that are within theparty here want to know that the conversation
exactly that you said will have theminvolved and it will revolve around the values
of the party. There is nota right wing platform, there's not a
traditional platform, there's not a progressiveplatform. There is one platform. So
subjectively, when and how and whereit's implemented is what will also cause voter
(10:39):
frustration, voter disconnect, voters disfranchise, and let's even ask the bigger question
why are there so many independents inthis state. They're almost their own party
at this point. But the bigdifference between the Republican Party and the Democratic
Party, the two that actually haveplatforms, is our principles. And if
you don't create a body that's stableon its platforms and use those principles as
(11:05):
a guiding document, then you'll neverbe able to grow because people will just
go. So it's subjective as towho's in charge. If you're talking about
values, so you said about principlesand money, or if you're just talking
about personalities and money, well,then again it just matters who's in charge,
is whether or not you feel likeyou're part of it or you're not.
You said you're going to do whateveryou're in your power to win races
(11:28):
this November. For Republicans, areyou going to call Mike Flood and Pete
Ricketts and Don Bacon or do theyhave to call you or how does that
work? Well, there's a fewof them that I've been told that I'm
not allowed to call them, thatthere's intermediates that I'm allowed to call.
I reached out to the governor,I've reached out to the lieutenant governor.
But I have great relationships with manyof our constitutional officers and legislative ones.
(11:50):
I will reach out to them.I will continue to put the overture Scott,
I've got the documentation of the amountof text message's, phone calls,
emails over the last two years yearsto ask for help. And in the
end, here's the other big thingwhen we look at the presidential race,
which is we are a state party, which is a component of the rn
C fifty six subsets are that theRNC has one primary goal and that's to
(12:13):
prepare for four years for the presidentialnomination and election. We have to help
facilitate that plan as well. Sothere's going to be a conversation that Bobbie
I won't have. It's going tobe above my pre a grade where people
have to go. Our job isto get President Trump elected, because you
are very sure that he's going tobe the presidential nominee out of our convention
(12:35):
in Milwaukeeame July, I'm not surewhat I'm fit into this as well.
Yeah, you know, I'm notsure what I'm sure of anymore when it
comes to all this. But Eric, right, I know that it was
a long primary season for you,long day, yesterday, long night.
I appreciate you taking time here thisafternoon and joining us. Thank you Scott, anytime,
Eighty percent support for Fisher and Ricketts, eighty percent for Flood, only sixty
percent for Bacon. We've talked alot about that, but when it comes
to the picks from the State RepublicanParty, for example, they said,
don't vote for Pete Ricketts instead,John Glenn Weaver should get your vote.
(00:20):
Well, John Glenn Weaver at lastcheck now has not quite fifteen percent support
in that Senate race. Dan Fryefared much better, but still fell short
of Don Bacon, and I Idon't know how much more bluntly I can
put it than this guy on xnamed Sam posted this yesterday last night,
(00:45):
saying anxiously awaiting a statement from theNebraska GOP of how proud they are of
their endorsed candidates. Pathetic and fecklessmiscalculation in my day would have cost my
chairman's job and the entire staff's job. But back in those days we had
expectations. How things change. That'sfrom Sam Fisher on Twitter X. So
(01:07):
we welcome now the chair of theNebraska Republican Party. Eric Underwood joins us
here on news radio eleven ten KFA. Be a pretty blunt assessment there,
Eric, how are you feeling today, I'm actually feeling pretty rested. I
feel pretty good with the fact thatthere are results out of that, as
you started to indicate of how manyRepublicans came across the finish line. And
(01:30):
to be honest, since we arethe state party, it's not something that
I'm so focused on one set ofraces over the other. So when you
look at everything from Board of Educationdown to legislative I feel very good with
where we're at as far as havingrepresentatives in the November elections, which is
part of the primary purpose. Well, one big thing that people look at
(01:51):
here is Nebraska's second district. Asyou know, the state Republican Party did
not endorse the incumbent Don Bacon.Challenger Dan Fry lost and as of this
morning when I talked to Dan,he and Don Bacon haven't talked. Don't
know if there be any reconciliation.I'm not sure what that means in terms
of support for November from Fry supporters, but kind of sounds like these are
(02:15):
your people as well. Will youendorse Don Bacon in his race this November
against Democrat Tony Vargas well. Theobjectives of the party and the constitutional requirements
are not going to change because ofthe primary. I would lose my integrity,
my character if I did that.The endorsement process is the conversation that
happens with the Central Committee, andyou know that it's been in reference before.
(02:38):
It's and a thousand other emails aboutthat. The Central Committee is one
hundred and sixty six people and ninetypercent of them attended the meeting that Dan
Fry and the many of the others, including Legislative District Ripson, his Board
of Education individuals were endorsed. SoI think it's fair to say if all
of a sudden, we just changeall the rules and just go, you
know what, they don't have toask for endorsements and we don't have to
(02:59):
go through the process. It's justunilateral decision making. And at what point
is there even a purpose of aparty of growing. And it's the same
thing when it comes to the RNCall the way to the national level.
They could have just said, youknow what, we're all supporting President Trump.
But they went through a process,and this is a process. It
also is something that does give reflection. I'm not going to deny that.
I think that we do have tohave a reflection on where and how a
(03:22):
party and a county party can beeffective in races, and what we can
do to make sure that when thegrowth happened, such as it did this
year, we doubled the amount ofcounty delegates, so we went through two
thousands to four thousand county delegates.When that growth happens, what can we
do within what opportunities do we haveto facilitate the constitutional objectives of the party,
(03:43):
and those constitutional objectives are objective,not subjective. We're here to further
our principles and we're here to maintainthe government of buying for the people and
tell that changes in the constitution.I'm not sure what to do differently,
but i think the greater story thatalso comes out of this is a level
of engagement that occurred as well,the amount of doors and interactions on all
(04:04):
campaigns here, both Democrat and Republicanhad a very low voter turnout this year.
Three hundred and thirty and thirty threethousand people showed up in twenty twenty
four. Now twenty twenty almost fivehundred thousand showed up, But back in
twenty sixteen it was three hundred andthirteen thousand and two hundred and twelve or
twenty twelve it was two hundred ninetyseven thousand. So is there something that
(04:26):
we as a party. I mean, both sides can look at it this
way, but we as the partyneed to be doing differently to engage the
voters the electorate to be involved,and specifically in my conversations with the Trump
team, which is President Trump's teamwhich is now integrated in the RNC,
there's a concern of the amount ofvotes that were attributed to him versus others.
This is something that they're seen andthat's a national level view, but
(04:47):
that the level of engagement is somethingthat we're going to he wants to effectively
focus on. It's getting out thevote to ensure that we win Congressional District
two. That those are the conversationsthat I want to move forward to.
What does Don Beacon need to doto get the support of the forty or
so percent that didn't support him duringyesterday's primary. Well, I have asked
(05:11):
from all elected officials and many ofthem have been a part of it to
build a relationship with the state partyand neither remind you that we worked with
Congressman Bacon in the twenty twenty tworace. We facilitated fifteen mailers through all
through that sit paid for by theNebraska Republican Party, facilitated the TV programs
that happened with it, and inearly twenty twenty three I invited him to
(05:32):
the Chairman's Retreat where he got tomeet all of the county chairs throughout a
party. This is this personality divide, not a value divide, at least
for the most part. The personalitydivide is whether or not we have the
opportunity to have relationships. And Ithink that's what majority of the Congressional of
the Central Committee, that one hundredand sixty six members, they would like.
(05:54):
They would like the opportunity they haverelationships with the elected officials, whether
it's the governor down to board representative. So that way our principles can be
furthered and we can help in twentytwenty three when we did in twenty twenty
three, when we interacted with mostof the legislative body, that's when the
electorate showed up. They went tothe Unit Caramel and they showed up in
(06:15):
force to all of those Subcommittee Aheringsfour hundred to five hundred people on everything
that was needed. Well, thatdoesn't happen overnight, and it doesn't happen
just by happenstance. There was anetwork that was created, a structure,
a communication network, so that waywhen a bill was brought up and they
needed support, the state Party organizedthem through all of our coalitions and said
(06:36):
let's go and support. That happenedin twenty twenty three. This has been
breaking down a little bit over time. My goal is to reinvigorate those relationships.
My assessment, which is worth asmuch as you're paying for it here
as we're talking with Eric Underwood,chairperson of the Nebraska Republican Party, my
(06:57):
assessment is that the former leadership ofthe state Republican Party, who I think
you could call someone like Pete Rickettsa leader of that former leadership of the
party, I think that they werevery wrong to ignore the more maga wing
of the Republican Party, that theyshut them down in state leadership roles that
(07:18):
sometimes they weren't heard. This goesall the way back to the Ron Paul
days and that kind of feeling likeyou're being ignored. People don't like that,
and you guys showed up in twentytwenty two and organized ready to go,
and the leadership changed. But myconcern here with the new leadership is
that it seems like too many ofthese really extreme right wing members of the
(07:45):
State Republican Party do have an allor nothing approach when it comes to a
candidate. We might agree on nineout of ten things, but if I
don't like your vote on that tenthing, you're out of here. We
might as well get a Democrat inthere, because they're no better than you.
And if these two sides don't cometogether, I think it's gonna be
(08:05):
hard for someone like Don Bacon towin this race in Nebraska's second district this
November. But let's take a lookhere at your assessment that Pete Ricketts was
not deserving of being elected here inthis case of what we re elected in
the Senate seat where he was appointed, and now we were doing this that
(08:26):
you thought the John Glenn Weaver wasa better candidate than Pete Ricketts. So
the people spoke and Ricketts got eightypercent support. Are they out of touch
with you or are you out oftouch with them? Well, you know,
Idin I think it speaks back towhether or not there's a relationship established
before the convention that happened in twentytwenty two. I sat down with Governor
(08:48):
Ricketts at the time, Governor andI said, this is going to be
a very impassionate convention here, butwe have a chance to harness this energy.
And that was the relationship that Iwanted to build with him. I
have continued to reach out. Icontinue to reach out to our governor.
I've made the overtures and I've gotit all documented of the times to build
out here. And if you lookat the federal though, let's be very
honest, this is something that peopleneed to understand. The federal candidates have
(09:09):
never used the state party as anapparatus to get elected. Congress important very
very little use that. Senator Statsdidn't use that. Congressman Smith hasn't Congress
and Bacon did use us in twentytwenty two, and Senator Fisher doesn't use
him that much. So as faras mailing or endorsements or request, sure
(09:30):
they might get the endorsement, butnothing else is facilitated through them other than
using maybe walkbook gaps and stuff likethat. So then again you ask yourself,
then what is the purpose of astate party and its relationship at the
federal level or even the governor's level. We do have an opportunity and it
was in our political plan to developthe county parties and we have exceeded that
exquications. That means that the goalinen of helping the Board of Education races
(09:54):
and the school board races. That'sthe secondary part of our political plan.
This is what we want to moveinto, is to go into the local
races and see where we can help, where you can win or lose by
fifty votes versus fifty thousand. Iwill do everything I can to be build
a bridge, stand on the bridge. But I think that the central Committee
and the individuals that are going tobe a part of moving this forward,
(10:16):
the leaders are that are within theparty here want to know that the conversation
exactly that you said will have theminvolved and it will revolve around the values
of the party. There is nota right wing platform, there's not a
traditional platform, there's not a progressiveplatform. There is one platform. So
subjectively, when and how and whereit's implemented is what will also cause voter
(10:39):
frustration, voter disconnect, voters disfranchise, and let's even ask the bigger question
why are there so many independents inthis state. They're almost their own party
at this point. But the bigdifference between the Republican Party and the Democratic
Party, the two that actually haveplatforms, is our principles. And if
you don't create a body that's stableon its platforms and use those principles as
(11:05):
a guiding document, then you'll neverbe able to grow because people will just
go. So it's subjective as towho's in charge. If you're talking about
values, so you said about principlesand money, or if you're just talking
about personalities and money, well,then again it just matters who's in charge,
is whether or not you feel likeyou're part of it or you're not.
You said you're going to do whateveryou're in your power to win races
(11:28):
this November. For Republicans, areyou going to call Mike Flood and Pete
Ricketts and Don Bacon or do theyhave to call you or how does that
work? Well, there's a fewof them that I've been told that I'm
not allowed to call them, thatthere's intermediates that I'm allowed to call.
I reached out to the governor,I've reached out to the lieutenant governor.
But I have great relationships with manyof our constitutional officers and legislative ones.
(11:50):
I will reach out to them.I will continue to put the overture Scott,
I've got the documentation of the amountof text message's, phone calls,
emails over the last two years yearsto ask for help. And in the
end, here's the other big thingwhen we look at the presidential race,
which is we are a state party, which is a component of the rn
C fifty six subsets are that theRNC has one primary goal and that's to
(12:13):
prepare for four years for the presidentialnomination and election. We have to help
facilitate that plan as well. Sothere's going to be a conversation that Bobbie
I won't have. It's going tobe above my pre a grade where people
have to go. Our job isto get President Trump elected, because you
are very sure that he's going tobe the presidential nominee out of our convention
(12:35):
in Milwaukeeame July, I'm not surewhat I'm fit into this as well.
Yeah, you know, I'm notsure what I'm sure of anymore when it
comes to all this. But Eric, right, I know that it was
a long primary season for you,long day, yesterday, long night.
I appreciate you taking time here thisafternoon and joining us. Thank you Scott, anytime,
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.