Road Map to the Texas Election Process #2
Welcome back to your Republican Party’s election process. To continue the explanation as to how your Texas Election Process works, this article will focus on how the Republican Party of Texas (RPT) and the State Republican Executive Committee (SREC) operates and functions. But before I start, just a quick update on a training session I attended in Austin (Sat, July 23rd), on election integrity. It was profes sionally administered by the Republican Party of Texas (RPT) and the Republican
National Committee (RNC) and was full of updated, relevant, and excellent information. Yes, the RNC has a permanent office in Texas! They are here, they are helping, and they are taking the upcoming midterm elections seriously.
As I go through these articles, I hope you will begin to see your very important role in this process, so thank you for ‘attending’ and stay tuned for more to come!
Follow me as I take you from the bottom up (grassroots), then back down with more detail. The basic structure goes like this: At the top of the structure are the Voters. The Voters elect their Precinct Chairs (bet you haven’t heard of a Precinct Chair before, huh?). These are the people in charge of county election sites and are usually your Elections Judges (bet you didn’t know you had an Elections Judge, huh? More about these folks in next week’s article). Below your County Executive Committee (CEC) is the State Republican Executive Committee (SREC), which works within the Republican Party of Texas (RPT). Texas has 31 Senate Districts (SD) which are each comprised of several counties and who each elect a Committeeman and Committeewoman. These Committeemen and Committeewomen comprise your Republican Party of Texas (RPT) State Republican Executive Committee (SREC). The RPTs SREC functions much the same way as the County
Executive Committee (CEC), except it is much larger and a bureaucracy. Unlike the county, the Republican Party of Texas (RPT) State Chair and Vice-Chair, as well as the State Republican Executive Committee (SREC), ARE NOT elected at the voting polls; they are elected at the State Convention, every 2-years, by delegates (more about delegates next week).
A little side jog: The Elections Division of the Texas Secretary of State (SOS) is responsible for administering the Texas Election Code, elections, voting systems, candidates, and political parties. They also maintain more than 16 million voter registration records on behalf of the State of Texas. The RPT and SREC work hand in glove with the Secretary of State (SOS) in the administration of elections, election code and many other election functions within the Secretary of State (SOS).
Ok – we’re on our way back up: The Republican Party of Texas (RPT) has a Chair, Vice-Chair and State Republican Executive Committee (SREC). They also have paid employees who can do a lot of the required work, without which, we as a party could not function. The RPT and SREC work to provide support, as needed, to make the counties successful. The SREC adheres to and works to ensure the Republican Party Planks are promulgated into law. Working to ensure the party planks become law is a long, laborious process that can take many years to accomplish and, despite the hard work, is not always successful.
The State Republican Executive Committeemen and women are elected by their Senate Districts (SD) at the State Convention. Bandera County is in Senate District 24 (SD-24), which is comprised of Bandera, Bell, Blanco, Brown, Burnet, Callahan, Comanche, Coryell, Gillespie, Hamilton, Kerr, Lampasas, Llano, Mills, San Saba counties and portions of Taylor and Travis counties. Committeemen and Committeewomen for each Senate District (SD) act much like a board of directors for the State Chair, like the county’s CEC acts sort of like a board of directors for the County Chair. It’s important to know, the RPTs SREC provides NO funding or assets to the counties within their Senate District (SD). Just like the county, the RPTs SREC members are not paid; they donate their time and their own money to support their Senate District (SD) and SREC duties, just as YOUR County Executive Committee (CEC) do to support our county. At the County level, your Precinct Chairs comprise your County Executive Committee (CEC) and include your County Chair. They are the voter’s representatives and are responsible for conducting the business of the County Republican Party.
When the process works correctly, it is extremely dynamic with simultaneous interaction between the county, SREC, RPT and SOS. The county is the focal point for all elections – elections cannot occur without the county. All the serious coordination and preparation, as well as voter registration, occurs at the county level, with help and support from the RPT, SREC and SOS. The county voters are who make the difference in elections!
This should give you a very basic idea of how the Republican Party of Texas is organized and functions, at the state level. It can’t be said enough…. The Republican Party of Texas is a grass roots, bottom-up organization! Next week, I will diagram the county: How it is organized and functions and why YOU are the most important part of our county and the Great State of Texas.!
Conrad Striegl is the Bandera County Republican Chair.