US President Donald Trump speaks before boarding Air Force One en route to the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, US, November 6, 2026. REUTERS/Eric Lee
Republican National Committee co-chair K.C. Crosbie is running against President Donald Trump’s chosen party chairman, Joe Gruters, after Republicans lost control of Congress — and Axios reports the move has angered the White House.
Crosbie told the RNC’s 168 members in a Thursday letter that “Tuesday’s results were a serious setback.” She said the party owes itself an honest look at why, asking whether it had addressed voters’ concerns, backed its candidates and nominated people who could win competitive races.
She wrote that the committee has fallen short and that she hopes to see that change.
Axios says the White House was caught off guard, and that officials are infuriated she didn’t call ahead to give the president notice of her plans. An administration official told the outlet she is co-chair only because of Trump and that her “amateur behavior” is why she shouldn’t lead the party. The official warned that if she won, Trump, Vice President J.D. Vance, and Cabinet officials would stop headlining RNC fundraisers, and Trump would pull his name and signature from fundraising appeals.
Trump quickly backed Gruters on Truth Social on Friday, giving him his “Complete and Total Endorsement” and crediting him with building an efficient, focused party operation.
The RNC chair is typically chosen by a sitting Republican president, making elections a formality, said Axios, noting that Trump picked both Crosbie and Gruters, who respectively succeeded both Trump's own daughter-in-law Lara Trump, and Michael Whatley, the GOP's losing candidate for Senate in North Carolina.
The committee votes at its January meeting in Scottsdale, Arizona.
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