Lara Trump officially announces for RNC co-chair, as Trump tightens grip on GOP

Donald Trump’s daughter-in-law Lara Trump officially kicked off her campaign to be Republican National Committee co-chair on Tuesday, the latest step in the former president’s takeover of the RNC.

Lara Trump wrote a letter to the 168 members of the RNC saying that she was “proud to have the endorsement of my father-in-law and 45th president, Donald J. Trump, for this position and understand the fundamental importance of this role.”

“In the coming days, I look forward to connecting with you, the members of the RNC, and hopefully earning your vote,” she added.

The move comes as Trump embarks on a sweeping effort to fuse his campaign with the RNC ahead of the general election. The former president is backing an ally, North Carolina GOP Chair Michael Whatley, to succeed outgoing RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel, and is installing his senior adviser Chris LaCivita as the committee’s chief operating officer. Whatley, who appeared onstage with Trump at his South Carolina primary victory party this past weekend, launched his campaign on Monday.

Behind the scenes, the campaign has begun working with the RNC to merge their efforts in various departments, including fundraising, data and political outreach — effectively putting the party apparatus under Trump’s roof.

Lara Trump outlined her vision for the committee in her letter. Touching on an issue of central importance to her father-in-law — Trump’s baseless claim that the 2020 election was stolen — she wrote that the committee should “build and activate the most effective battleground state election integrity program Republicans have ever had.”

She also said the RNC would “do a deep dive through all of the RNC’s existing contracts and vendor agreements, identifying what’s useful and what isn’t to taking back the White House.” She said the committee would “prioritize the fundamental mechanics of winning elections to ensure that we triumph in close races.”

McDaniel announced on Monday that she will step down from her post early next month. The RNC will hold its leadership election on March 8 at a meeting in Houston, where the candidates for chair and co-chair will need to win a majority of support from the committee’s 168 members. Whatley and Lara Trump are expected to prevail easily, given their support from the former president, who is broadly popular among the committee’s members. So far, they are running unopposed.

As Trump tightens his grip on the Republican nomination, his team has been taking other steps to unite the party’s operation around him, even as Trump himself continues to attack Nikki Haley, his faltering chief primary rival. Earlier this month, Trump met at his Mar-a-Lago resort with House Speaker Mike Johnson and National Republican Congressional Committee Chair Richard Hudson to talk about House races.

Meanwhile, LaCivita and Josh Holmes, a top adviser to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, have been having back-channel conversations involving, among other things, coordinating on Trump’s involvement in Senate races. The conversations were first reported by the New York Times.

Trump’s moves to take over the RNC have met pushback within some corners of the party. Henry Barbour, an RNC committee member from Mississippi, has introduced a pair of resolutions that would prevent the committee from being used to pay Trump’s legal bills and that would ensure the committee is neutral until Trump has secured the necessary number of delegates to be the presumptive nominee. It is unclear whether the resolutions, which are non-binding, will have enough support to go to a vote before the full committee.

Trump advisers have insisted RNC funds will not be used to pay for Trump’s legal bills.

The former president recently asked his daughter-in-law to be co-chair, a person familiar with the discussion said. Lara Trump has been a high-profile surrogate for her father-in-law, frequently appearing on TV shows and on the campaign trail for him. She served as a senior adviser on Trump’s 2020 reelection campaign, and was briefly mentioned as a North Carolina Senate candidate during the 2022 midterm elections.