A new San Antonio Young Republicans club wants to change the face of the state party convention happening in its city in less than two months.
Roughly 9,000 delegates from across the state will gather at the Henry B. González Convention Center for the Texas Republican Convention May 23-25. They’ll be tasked with crafting the state party platform, which lays out the values of the GOP’s most active supporters.
Past priorities have ranged from the obvious to the odd and, often, inflammatory. The 2022 platform, for example, made headlines for its provocative ideas about sex education in schools. It also took a stance against lane reductions, or “road diets,” which municipalities like San Antonio have sought to use to create pedestrian-friendly corridors.
The year’s convention will also produce a new leader for the state party, as Chairman Matt Rinaldi is not seeking reelection.
“We want our young Republicans to go through the process to become voting delegates so they can vote on our platform priorities because Republicans are a lot of older people,” said Lillian Miess, a marketing professional who serves as the club’s president.
But Miess, who was recruited to start the San Antonio chapter by leaders of the new statewide Young Republicans of Texas club, cautioned against the idea that attracting younger members would shift the direction of the party.
She said she wants to see the party continue addressing concerns about what’s being taught at public schools, where she wouldn’t feel comfortable sending children in the future.
That perspective seemed to match that of the attendees at the group’s first gathering at the Angry Elephant on March 19, which featured a slate of conservative candidates running for school board in the North East Independent School District.
The event drew roughly 60 attendees, though some appeared to be outside of the club’s target age range of 18-40.
Rinaldi, whose legacy centers around weeding out Republicans who veer from the GOP platform, gave the keynote address, suggesting state convention attendees will get to make an important choice about the party’s future.
He said the party could “just be a chair-giving society” that allows anyone a seat at the table, or “continue on the path we’re currently on, and make meaningful changes in policy and be a part of the conversation.”
Charting new territory
The new club comes as some of the state’s conservative leaders have taken a growing interest in Bexar County, a Democratic stronghold that’s better known for producing moderate GOP officeholders like former Texas Speaker Joe Straus.
Some of those long-time incumbents, like former state Rep. Lyle Larson and former state Sen. Jeff Wentworth, have already been replaced by more conservative successors. Conservative former Bexar County GOP Chair Mark Dorazio succeeded Larson, who retired in 2022, and state Sen. Donna Campbell, an ally of Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, unseated Wentworth in the primary in 2012.
But after redistricting made some of the county’s GOP-held state legislative and congressional districts even more friendly to Republicans, groups like the Young Republicans of Texas and True Texas, which started in deeply red Northeast Tarrant County, have seized the opportunity to continue pushing local officeholders to the right.
Momentum appeared to be on their side during the March 6 primary, where conservative challengers trounced a number of longtime Republicans, including one in Bexar County.
Longtime state House Rep. Steve Allison lost to insurgent Marc LaHood in Texas’ 121st House District, while U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales was pushed to a May 28 runoff after facing four opponents in the primary. Gonzales’ runoff opponent, 28-year-old Brandon Herrera, is expected to address the Young Republicans of San Antonio’s next gathering on April 16.
“Core [conservative] values are definitely the definitive role here,” said Trey Box, a political consultant who worked on the campaigns of Gov. Greg Abbott and former U.S. Rep. Myra Flores, and now serves as vice president of the San Antonio Young Republicans. “You have Republicans in name only, and you have Republicans that are actually charting the course for Texas to be the way it is.”
While the San Antonio Young Republicans see opportunity in capturing ultra-conservative young people who aren’t engaged in politics yet, other longtime Republicans believe the path to growing their numbers is a more inclusive party that courts voters unsatisfied with their current Democratic leadership.
One group in particular, the Young Republicans of Bexar County, worries the new young Republican club could run off potential supporters who are dipping their toes into politics for the first time. Its leaders said they’ve already heard from people who mistook the two groups.
“We’ve been around since the 1970s and we’ve had a great number of alumni come out of our group,” said Young Republicans of Bexar County Vice President Katherine Herrera, whose club meets monthly at EZ’S Brick Oven & Grill on the North Side.
“We’re very welcoming,” she added. “We want to kind of change the way people think of Republicans by making it open to people who want to learn about the party.”
For Herrera, a Harlandale-McCollum Neighborhood Association board member who ran unsuccessfully for City Council in District 3 several years ago, keeping the party as broad as possible is a matter of practicality.
Republicans currently control a single seat on the Bexar County Commissioners Court, Precinct 3, which former President Donald Trump carried by less than a percentage point in 2020. Commissioner Grant Moody (Pct. 3) survived a challenge from the right in March and attended Tuesday’s gathering at the Angry Elephant.
On the San Antonio City Council, whose members are nonpartisan, only District 10 has reliably sent a conservative voice to the dais in recent years. Democrat Beto O’Rourke carried that district with almost 54% of the vote in the governor’s race in 2022, but incumbent Councilman Marc Whyte still faces regular pressure from the right.
“You’ll find with our group… we’re all known activists,” said Young Republicans of Bexar County President Paul James, who stressed his group’s concern for the uphill challenges local Republicans face. “We’re precinct chairs. We’ve been involved with the different women’s groups and probably almost all of us have run for office before.”
Miess contends there’s plenty of room for the two groups to coexist and envisions her club drawing more supporters from outside the city’s urban core, among military families and gun enthusiasts who might not yet be engaged in politics.
“We’re trying to provide a place where conservative, Christian-minded people can find friends,” she said. “It’s a hub for people who want to get involved in the grassroots movement.”
Change on the horizon?
In a nod to the influence statewide politics are having downstream, the larger organizations that both the San Antonio Young Republicans and the Young Republicans of Bexar County are under have also been feuding over the direction of the party.
Last year the Young Republicans of Bexar County’s parent organization, the Texas Young Republican Federation (TYRF), voted to disassociate from the state party over disagreements with Rinaldi.
Shortly after that decision, a faction of members who wanted to remain aligned with the state GOP formed the Young Republicans of Texas, which is now opening chapters like the one Miess runs across the state.
The two statewide groups are embroiled in a legal battle surrounding confusion over their similar names, and TYRF has accused the Young Republicans of Texas of courting support from anti-semites.
Like the Republican Party of Texas, Bexar County GOP Chair Jeff McManus has also taken a side in the fight. He attended last Tuesday’s gathering at the Angry Elephant and told the San Antonio Report he’d replaced the Young Republicans of Bexar County with the new Young Republicans of San Antonio on the county party’s website.
Both McManus and Rinaldi will soon be out of office, however, and leaders of the longstanding groups are optimistic the era of attacking fellow Republicans could fade with them.
Republicans in Bexar County have already chosen a peace-maker as their next county party chair — a role that’s bounced between big-tent and small-tent champions regularly in recent years. Incoming Bexar GOP leader Kris Coons plans to end McManus’s effort to purge the party’s moderates, which lasted just a single term.
While the race for state party chair will likely be far more contentious, TYRF President Derrick Wilson told the San Antonio Report that his group will take a second look at the new leadership.
“If Matt Rinaldi is gone, and the Republican Party of Texas looks like it’s moving in a positive direction, then we will want to be reassociated with RPT,” Wilson said.
If not, he added, “This organization has been around for almost 70 years and it will continue to exist after we are no longer with it. We’re just stewarding it to the next generation.”
