Corrected version
One of the Republican Party’s top priorities is electing more Republican local officials, and the Democrats have been a big help, a top GOP leader said Thursday.
“(Democrats) have created an atmosphere where it’s difficult to be a Democrat and a conservative anymore,” Joe Nosef, chairman of the Mississippi Republican Party, told the Greenwood Kiwanis Club on Thursday.
As an example, Nosef said that U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, a self-described socialist and independent who caucuses with the Democrats, would be coming to Mississippi for a Mississippi Democratic Party fundraiser.
Sanders will appear at Democratic fundraiser in Jackson on Wednesday night. Earlier that day, he will appear at a town hall meeting on economic justice in Jackson.
“They (Democrats) are helping us show what the differences in the parties mean,” he said.
Nosef, an attorney in Jackson, is a Clarksdale native and a graduate of the University of Mississippi. He served as Gov. Haley Barbour’s chief counsel from 2004-06 before resigning to lead Barbour’s 2007 re-election campaign. In 2008, he served as chief of staff for Lt. Gov. Phil Bryant. He served as the head of the gubernatorial transition team after Bryant was elected governor in 2011.
In 2012, Mississippi Republican Party Chairman Arnie Hederman resigned and Nosef was elected to serve out the remainer of Hederman’s term. In 2012, Nosef was elected to a four-year term in that job.
Nosef said the biggest election looming for Mississippi Republicans is the 2014 U.S. Senate race. Incumbent Thad Cochran, Mississippi’s senior senator, who is 75, hasn’t announced whether he will seek a seventh term.
Nosef said he had “no idea” whether Cochran would run but hoped he would. That’s because if the Republicans take the Senate and House in 2014, Cochran’s seniority “would put him in a very powerful position,” Nosef said.
“If (Cochran) doesn’t run, we’ll probably have eight people running,” he said.
Nosef said the Mississippi Republican Party had come a long way since 2001.
“Twelve years ago, the Mississippi GOP had one statewide elected offical out of eight and didn’t have the Senate and the House,” Nosef said. “Now we have seven of eight statewide offices and both houses in the Legislature.
“There’s been a big shift in the South and in Mississippi, as well.”
Nosef admitted there had been some tensions within the national Republican Party, especially between tea party members and mainstream Republicans. The divides have been sharpened by the current budget battle, which has resulted in the shutdown of the federal government, and the looming fight over whether to increase the national debt ceiling.
Much of the infighting in the GOP is jockeying between potentionial candidates in the 2016 presidential race who are “trying to differentiate themselves,” Nosef said. “It’s going to be an interesting two years.”
Nosef says he doesn’t see sharp divides in the Mississippi GOP between the tea party and mainstream groups.
“I think in Mississippi we have a very good relationship,” he said. “I think that the reason for that is the governor. Phil Bryant has been called the first tea party governor.
“I can’t imagine a state where (the relationship is) any better than it has been here.”
Nosef put most of the blame for the federal budget impasse on Democratic President Barack Obama.
“You need to be able to work with people you disagree with,” Nosef said.
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• Contact Charles Corder at 581-7241 or ccorder@gwcommonwealth.com.
