Global Courant
Michigan Republicans have disagreement about the direction of the state party and the situation resulted in alleged physical violence Saturday night at a state commission meeting, The Detroit News reported.
James Chapman, a Republican from Wayne County, told the paper he had traveled to the town of Clare to attend the party rally at the Doherty Hotel. But the meeting was reserved for members of the state commission. So Chapman said he and others gathered outside the meeting location and recited the Pledge of Allegiance. He also said he tried to open a door to the conference room by shaking the doorknob.
Clare County Republican Party chairman Mark DeYoung said he heard Chapman’s attempt to enter the room and opened the door after seeing someone throw the bird through a window. “He kicked my balls as soon as I opened the door,” DeYoung said of Chapman, speaking to The Detroit News by phone from the emergency room.
DeYoung added that Chapman attacked him, slamming his body into a chair and saying he now has a broken rib. He plans to press charges.
“We are so divided,” DeYoung told the paper. “I wish we could get together.”
The paper also interviewed Chapman, who admitted to grabbing DeYoung’s legs and pushing him over, though Chapman said DeYoung threatened him by saying, “I’ll beat you up”, and lashed out at him. DeYoung denied Chapman’s claims.
Chapman also said he took off his glasses during the confrontation. “If you see me take off my glasses, I’m ready to rock,” said Chapman.
Police confirmed to The Detroit News that a complaint had been filed about the rally, but declined to provide additional information.
Michigan Republicans are struggling to find a way forward after losing control of the state’s legislatures for the first time in nearly 40 years. State President Kristina Karamo, an election denier, has a falling out with the party’s co-chair about budget problems. Karam too refused to give in her loss in the 2022 Michigan Secretary of State election, and she, along with others, was ordered to pay more than $58,000 in legal fees for file an unfounded lawsuit challenging absentee votes in Detroit. The lawsuit, in which Karamo was the lead plaintiff, was “full of speculation, a lack of facts, and a lack of understanding of Michigan’s electoral statutes and Detroit’s absentee voting procedures,” the judge wrote.
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The state of the Michigan GOP is so chaotic, this isn’t even the first physical altercation at a state party rally this year. In April, the police were called two Republicans got into a fight. In video captured of the incident, Kalamazoo Republican Party Chairman Kelly Sackett appears to be knocking a cigarette and phone out of Macomb County GOP Secretary Melissa Pehlis’s hand. Pehlis then pushed her open hand to Sackett’s head.
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