Diving into the Turning Point: The U.S. Role in the Trump 2024 Ground Game

So I tried to delve deeper into my new favorite secret: the GOP ground operation and what on earth is going on with it. So far, I've been looking back at articles I had read upon publication and re-reading them, and articles I hadn't read and read for the first time, to find clues to the Trump/RNC primary game question, that I asked was discussed in the last few posts. One thing I didn't fully grasp, or perhaps had forgotten, is that Turning Point USA and its chief Charlie Kirk played a huge role in driving the downfall of Ronna McDaniel at the RNC. And the push appears to have been largely to take over or play a larger role in the GOP's field operations. So a significant portion of the impetus for all of this appears to be coming from Turning Point and its campaign arm, Turning Point Action. So that's a clue.

Then there is the question of the TPM reader DK collected for us yesterday. Democrats use NGP VAN as a platform for voter outreach and field operations. The app version is called MiniVAN. Republicans often use NationBuilder, which is actually a nonpartisan app, unlike NGP VAN, which is only for progressives and Democrats. DK said this:

“The Republican Party primarily uses NationBuilder, a perfectly functioning platform. Have these SuperPACs and so forth also contracted with NationBuilder? Again, if this were the case, the impact on the game on site might be minimal. If they have some sort of venture capitalist disruptor idea of ​​building their own databases or whatever, then I’ll have a really good laugh.”

So it turns out Is a new app. I'm not entirely sure what the app is called, but it was developed by a company called Superfeed Technologies. And Superfeed is either owned or run by a man named Tyler Bowyer, the COO of Turning Point. (Bowyer is also a sham voter from Arizona who is currently facing charges in the state.) Superfeed appears to have been owned or operated by several different groups of Arizona conservatives over several years. But now at least it's controlled by Bowyer.

So that's interesting.

It's important to note that a new app doesn't necessarily mean a new data ecosystem. To my knowledge, the big player for the GOP voter file is a company called DataTrust. To go deeper into this DKs If you have different apps that all access the same voter file and voter data database, the impact of using one app over another may be limited.

Whatever the story of Superfeed, Bowyer appears to have been the one who developed the app. Or it was his project. In February, for example, at a Turning Point summit called “Restoring National Confidence,” Bowyer and other Turning Pointers suggested state and local parties transfer their outreach and canvassing efforts to the Superfeed app.

Sometime in 2023, they began enlisting major right-wing donors for a $108 million plan to do GOTV work in Arizona, Wisconsin and a third state, either Georgia or Michigan. The stories seem different. This New Yorker article describing Turning Point's current operations in Arizona reports that in 2021, Bowyer helped prepare a report for McDaniel on how to mobilize grassroots Republicans. However, according to a Turning Point Action source quoted in the article, Ronna said, “Until later, and that's basically it, she didn't take it seriously.” This anecdote appears in a number of stories: Basically, the point is, how Turning Point and Bowyer, who was then co-chair of the RNC rank-and-file committee and a national RNC committee member, went to McDaniel with a plan to stop losing election after election and had she rejected the idea because She just didn't care. As you can see, the anecdote becomes something of an origin story for McDaniel's eventual downfall and how Turning Point got into the GOTV business. The same source (who could well be Bowyer himself) continued: “It was kind of like, 'If they don't do it, we will.' So we just started building it ourselves.”

What this all means for the GOP ground operation in 2024, I don’t know. But it seems to me at least clearer, clearer than before, that the impetus for a lot of these things came from Turning Point USA, Charlie Kirk and the people around him. They began pushing their role as the GOP's GOTV overseers, and McDaniel's opposition to this led to his year-long war against them, which played a major role in their eventual downfall. The biggest immediate impact of this changing of the guard, with daughter-in-law Lara Trump and Michael Whatley taking power, was the shutdown of the RNC's GOTV and field operations and outsourcing to outside groups, the largest of which was Turning Point USA and its affiliated groups.

Another detail.

When Turning Point first unveiled its $108 million plan for GOTV work, it was for three states: Arizona (where they are based), Wisconsin and Georgia. In some reports it was Arizona, Wisconsin and Michigan, with more activists active in all swing states. The lack of details on Georgia or Michigan could indicate that the plan was flexible depending on who agreed to fund the plan. According to a Turning Point spokesperson, the list was reduced to Arizona and Wisconsin by late summer due to limited funding. Just this evening, Politico reported that Turning Point is pulling out of Wisconsin and turning its operations over to Elon Musk's America PAC. The plan is presented as combined operations. But read the article and that's not all. Andrew Kolvet, spokesman for Turning Point, told Politico: “With America PAC covering the majority of the organization's expenses in Wisconsin, Turning Point Action will now redirect resources to its existing field program in Arizona and a new initiative where the organization is responsible for Hotels.” Rooms for volunteers to knock on doors during the early voting periods in Wisconsin and Arizona.” The decision is “not only good for Wisconsin,” but allows Turning Point Action “to get involved in Arizona as well.” .

In other words, Turning Point Action, which appears to have played a major role in shaping the 2024 GOP floor game plan and was envisioned as a force to take over the work from the RNC, now appears to be due to fieldwork in Arizona reaching an agreement to pay for hotel rooms in Wisconsin.

Like I said, let me know what you see and hear.

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