The Fresno County Republican Party has two people claiming to be the chairperson for the 2025-2026 term.
Committee Chairperson Liz Kolstad was reelected at the organizational meeting on Jan. 7, but Committee member Peter Halajian claims that the organizational meeting disenfranchised some voters, leading to a second meeting at a Denny’s restaurant where he was elected as the new chairperson.
The big picture: Kolstad won reelection as the party chair on a 15-14 vote on the Jan. 7 meeting, with other board members also being voted on.
- After the meeting, Halajian and 15 other committee members met at a nearby Denny’s to reconvene the meeting. Halajian told The Sun he was elected as the chairperson with 16 votes.
Halajian’s claims: Halajian said Kolstad’s election was illegitimate, mostly due to two committee members being barred from voting.
- Austin Gilbert has been the ex-officio member for former State Senate candidate David Shepard, who has moved to Idaho. Halajian said Gilbert was not allowed to enter the meeting because Shepard no longer lives in California, even though Gilbert had been voting on the committee in place of Shepard for around two years.
- Halajian also said that committee member Connie Brooks arrived for the meeting at 5:59 p.m., ahead of the 6:05 p.m. start time, but was denied entry by a security guard. The committee moved ahead with the vote for chairperson, eventually letting Brooks in afterward. Halajian said he has a timestamped picture of Brooks arriving before the start of the meeting.
The other side: Kolstad told The Sun that Brooks did not arrive at the meeting by 6 p.m. If she had, she would’ve been allowed to enter.
- Kolstad added that Gilbert was also not even present at the meeting at all, meaning he wasn’t excluded from voting.
- But the committee’s bylaws, according to Kolstad, would have prevented Gilbert from participating anyways because Shepard no longer lives in California. Kolstaad said Gilbert had been voting for two years in place of Shepard because no one informed the committee’s board members until recently that Shepard moved away. Moving out of the district means someone is automatically no longer a member, Kolstad said.
Zoom in: Much of the controversy and outcry before the start of the meeting centered on alternate voters.
- Kolstad said 20 to 30 people were waiting outside of the gates to come in, but that the meeting was only open to current voting members of the organization meeting. The committee sent out notice to its members in December, which detailed the bylaws. The bylaws state that regular members must be sworn in at the organizational meeting before alternate members can be appointed.
What we’re watching: Halajian declared the election results from the second meeting to the California Republican Party on Jan. 8.
- He also sent over their complaints about Gilbert and Brooks not having a vote for chairperson.
- Halajian wants the state party to either recognize his election as chairperson or to set aside both elections and have a third party oversee another election where everyone gets to vote.
- But Kolstad, who has also been in contact with the state party, said the state party does not have any actual purview over local committee elections.
- Section 1.03 of the California Republican Party’s bylaws reads, in part, “The Committee works together with the local Republican county and district central committees, which are provided for in the California Elections Code and operate under their own bylaws and direction with respect to local election campaigns.”
What they’re saying: “There was zero reason for the chair and vice chair to keep this woman standing out in the cold,” Halajian said of Brooks. “She wasn’t even late. At first I thought she was until I saw that picture, and no, she was on time. There was zero reason for them to bounce her like that.”
- Halajian added, “Had it not been for these two members being disenfranchised practically, I would’ve won. It would’ve been 16 to 15.”
- He continued, “It’s sad that this is what it’s come to. I had really hoped that we could start out 2025-2026 all in the same direction, but you don’t get to claim that you’re the party of election integrity and then go around messing with your own elections.”
- The California Republican Party did not return a request for comment from The Sun.
- “It was completely illegitimate,” Kolstad told The Sun regarding the Denny’s vote. “You can’t hold your own meetings just because you don’t like the way an election turned out and then expect people to find it legitimate. It’s completely absurd. It’s like not liking what happened when the Board of Supervisors were elected, and so people get together and say, ‘OK, I’m the new Board of Supervisors.’ That’s not how it works.”
- The Fresno County Republican Party issued a statement Monday morning calling the allegations of election misconduct “meritless.”
- The party said no one challenged the authority of Kolstad to pass the committee’s budget during the meeting on Jan. 7.
- “Instead, they accepted the authority of the Chair and Committee to act for the Party,” the statement reads. “When business concluded, the Chair announced Adjournment; none of the Complainers voiced any problem with the meeting or Adjournment.”
