The elected members who run the state GOP have selected the delegates for the Republican National Convention in Cleveland this summer.
Ohio Republican Party Chairman Matt Borges will be the delegation chairman. Other top party members will serve in key positions, including Tracey Winbush, the newly elected treasurer of the state central committee.
Winbush, a backer of Gov. John Kasich in his bid for the presidency, told the group it’s important to unify behind the Republican nominee, whoever that might end up being -- even if it’s Donald Trump, a man she has repeatedly lambasted on her radio show in Youngstown.
“No, I don’t like Trump. I don’t like Hillary more. And at the end of the day, I would rather have Trump than Hillary.”
Gary Burkholder, another member of the state central committee, is a strong critic of the state party’s leadership. Burkholder says he voted for Trump in the primary and thinks the frontrunner has gained so much traction because he realizes many don’t have a voice in the current political system.
“Part of the reason he’s had success is because the middle class, the everyday working individual says, 'What do I have to lose?' At least he’s talking to the issues, whether you agree or not, and he’s willing to tell it like it is.”
Ohio’s 66 GOP delegates are bound to Kasich because the winner of the Republican primary takes all in the Buckeye State. Borges says delegates should be thankful for that because they won’t be relentlessly lobbied by other candidates to change their votes before going into the convention this summer -- if Trump doesn’t have the 1,237 delegates he needs to clinch the nomination.
