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MISHAWAKA, Ind. — The new leadership of the St. Joseph County GOP has officially destroyed the party, with youth and minority involvement now essentially non-existent. Earlier this summer, monthly GOP meetings were standing-room-only with a mix of conservatives of all ages, races and backgrounds. Now, in the last meeting before the election, the crowd is about half of what it was just a few months ago. All of this DESPITE the election lead-up meeting historically being one of the highest attended meetings every-single-year.
The GOP held its last meeting before the election this past Saturday. Photos show the crowd was approximately half the size of that seen in every meeting this year through June. Earlier this summer, all of the chairs were occupied with people standing along the walls and a dozen others standing near and outside of the front door. Saturday’s meeting shows half empty tables and attendees with an average age of about 70-years-old. There were only a handful of people under the age of 50 and only one minority appearing to be in attendance.
Below are photos showing the contrast of enthusiasm. The first photo is from the meeting this past Saturday. The other photos show the GOP meeting from July 13th. Once again, the October meeting is historically one of the best attended meetings every year.
Since the departure of GOP Chair Tyler Gillean and Vice Chair Trisha Carrico earlier this summer, the new leadership of the GOP (Chairwoman Jackie Horvath and Vice Chair Joe Layne) has made historically bad decisions, alienating the base while pushing out the energetic MAGA crowd consisting of younger conservatives and minorities.
The first major mistake was made in July when Layne and Horvath began pushing for party members to sign Non-Disclosure agreements.
“We have discussed potentially for those that would have sensitive information but nothing yet set in stone.” Horvath told RNM via text at the time.
Several sources have also detailed information regarding the leadership’s involvement in policing social media. Those sources tell RNM that anyone who is on a committee or in a leadership position would not be allowed to like or share certain social media posts that could be viewed as critical of other Republicans, specifically any story or post written by RNM. Punishment for violating the NDA or social media policy would be the ousting from committees and possible censuring, according to sources.
Since the NDA debacle, Horvath and Layne have continued their pattern of bad decision making. The party downplayed a Domestic Violence incident involving GOP Probate Judge Candidate Loris Zappia, announced that they were going to pay for the funeral of an alleged gang member, secretly pushed for solar farm development, helped remove a MAGA school board candidate from the ballot, supported Councilwoman Amy Drake in a push to essentially defund the St. Joseph County Police Department and MUCH MORE.
For the past decade, young leaders, starting with Zach Potts (who tragically died in a car crash with Congresswoman Jackie Walorski in 2022), made a concerted effort to grow the party by bringing in youth and diversity. Horvath and Layne were able to destroy Potts’ legacy in a matter of months.
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