McCain wins MI GOP proxy fight (update)

Two sources at the Michigan Republican Party Convention report that John McCain’s campaign defeated Mitt Romney’s campaign in a clear proxy fight at the convention in the battle for Youth Chair.

While neither campaign endorsed in the race, staffers from both campaigns were managing the floor fights for their respective candidates. Matt Hall, supported by McCain, beat Trevor Pittsley supported by Romney, by 8 votes out of approximately 2,000. For pictures and lists of supporters, see their facebook groups (Hall, Pittsley)

By all accounts, Saul Anuzi and the MRP staff were pushing hard for Pittsley.

Details forthcoming.

Update: Youth Chair has a vote on MRP’s Executive Committee. An MRP staffer tells me that they weren’t working that hard and that there was merely "lots of overlap" between Tippsley’s volunteers and the Romney volunteers.

Update II: MI Secretary of State, Terri Lynn Land, introduced and endorsed Hall. Hall won the first ballot by 20 votes, but Tippsley then challenged a bunch of delegations to knock it down to 8. This was the only contested race for MRP officers, although earlier, Saul’s spot had been contested. That had been a proxy fight between Dave DiShaw, now McCain’s MI grassroots chairman, and Saul. However, after MI AG Mike Cox, McCain’s MI Co-Chair, endorsed Saul, and Saul endorsed an open primary, DiShaw dropped out, leaving Saul uncontested for chair. Hotline has the details here and here.

Update III: Katie Packer, Romney’s Michigan consultant (?), reportedly consoled Pitssley that "sometimes you lose to the devil". That sounds like a proxy fight to me. Also, Young Americans for Freedom protested Romney with signs saying "Rinos for Romney".

Update IV: Apparently Packer’s vitriol is because she has a losing record against McCain’s MI team, Chuck and John Yob. A further source has told me that Packer refers to Chuck Yob as "the devil". An interesting thing to note is that Yob’s grassroots conservative coalition held together in this proxy fight. Does this suggest that Romney is not succeeding on the right and McCain is? Will Romney be able to keep moderates with Giuliani in the race? Interesting implications.