Since the late 1980’s Kevin McCarthy has been involved in California GOP youth politics. Even with his election to the Assembly, and now to Congress, his interest in trying to maintain control 
over a California Young Republicans group could be characterized as an obsession. McCarthy (pictured, right), rather notoriously strong-armed State GOP Chairman Ron Nehring with a threatening phone call during the last state party convention, unhappy with a decision of the CRP Rules Committee on an obscure YR issue.
To the surprise of many observers, the handpicked leaders of the McCarthy/Abernathy (Mark Abernathy is a Bakersfield-based political consultant who, along with McCarthy, continues to be very engaged in YR politics) operation — Jenniffer Rodriguez and Rohit Joy — rebelled against them. The new California Young Republican leaders supported someone other than the McCarthy/Abernathy pick for the national chair for Young Republicans (McCarthy himself is a former YRNF Chairman). Rodriguez and Joy then set forward with a merger of the California Young Republicans with the Young Republican Federation of California. (For nearly two decades the state has had two YR organizations as hundreds of activists over the years have fled CYR due to the McCarthy/Abernathy shenanigans). This merger had long been supported by most Republican leaders.
When the McCarthy/Abernathy machine was unsuccessful in tossing out the rebel leaders during the next round of elections they brought a legal action. The legal action was designed to intimidate Rodriguez and Joy by naming them personally as defendants in the legal action. The CYR rules provide for arbitrations to be brought against CYR to contest an election. The McCarthy/Abernathy strategy was to reverse the process and bring an action in the name of CYR against these two individuals personally and to make them personally responsible for $50,000.00 in arbitrator’s fees and damages. They even went to the extent of hiring a high powered attorney, Glen Summers, to press the attack. Not having the financial resources to fight back, Rodriguez and Joy were within one week of having an arbitration heard and decided against them.
Former California Republican Party Chairman Michael Schroeder (pictured left) then agreed to take on Rodriguez and Joy’s case for free. Schroeder then assembled a legal team that included well known Republican attorneys Adam Abrahms and Dave Bartels.
Schroeder first went into court on the morning that the arbitration was set to start and requested a judge to grant a temporary restraining order restraining the arbitrator and the McCarthy/Abernathy forces from going forward. This was critical because the arbitrator had ruled in favor of the McCarthy/Abernathy group throughout (which I find to be rather odd). The restraining order was granted (see the FR story on that here).
This set up the crucial battle — Schroeder v. Summers, with Schroeder having to convince the judge that more likely than not, he was going to win by proving that the arbitrator had no jurisdiction to go forward because Rodriguez and Joy had never agreed to be personally liable for anything. Yesterday, the Judge did just that and has now completely shut down this attack on Rodriguez and Joy.
Schroeder commented, “we will be in court next month pursuing an order that McCarthy’s group follow the dispute resolution procedures and rules of the California Republican Party and the California Young Republicans. We are gratified that the judge saw the merit in our position.”
To my friend Kevin McCarthy, who is set to become the Republican Whip in the new Congress, I humbly suggest that it is time to “let go” of Young Republican politics, and focus more attention on restoring greatness to our nation.
December 10th, 2010 at 12:00 am
Thanks for posting the story Jon… As you know and many of your readers know the attacks on Rohit, Jenniffer, and most of our board members are unwarranted, unfair, and down right absurd. We look forward to going ahead with our merger and finally having one YR organization in California. My hope is that someday Congressman McCarthy can get on board with the merged organization and help further the young activist cause within the party. We look forward to supporting Republican candidates across the state in the years to come on a unified front.
Ashley Ingram
Executive Director- YRFC
Los Angeles Rep- CYR
December 10th, 2010 at 12:00 am
There are Republicans and then there are republican politicians.
When a politician changes from being a activist in his or her own party into a pompous a** is typically between 45 minutes to three hours from winnnig his first election.
Being this the case, why would a politician desire to memorialize it for the world to see?
This guy should put an egg in his shoe and beat it. Stop harrasing the people he is supposed to be helping, leading and being an example to.
This type of Cling-On control comes from the same DNA that also causes Congressmen to ignore Americans demand for term limits.
78% of Americans want term limits in Congress.
This is another example of why.
December 10th, 2010 at 12:00 am
P.S. I am glad to hear that Mr. Schroeder and Mr. Bartels were able to help with this.