On Friday’s “On the Record with Greta van Susteren,” Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus criticized Eva Longoria’s so-called Latino Victory Project, which claims to be a nonpartisan organization that promotes Latino candidates for public office.
However, Priebus charged that the organization is partisan because it only promotes Democratic Latino candidates for office.
Transcript as follows:
VAN SUSTEREN: The RNC taking on actress Eva Longoria. In a letter posted online, the RNC blasting Longoria’s Latino victory project claiming it does not support Latino candidates, only Democratic ones. RNC chair Reince Priebus joins us. Nice to see you, sir.
REINCE PRIEBUS, REPUBLICAN NATIONAL COMMITTEE CHAIR: Hey, Greta, nice to see you too.
VAN SUSTEREN: I’ve seen you blasted the actress.
PRIEBUS: Well, I mean, it’s totally bogus organization. I mean, here’s the thing. They started out and say, we want the political landscape to match the identities and reflect the realities of the American people. Great. They say they are nonpartisan organization. OK. Then you start looking at who’s in charge of this organization. Well, OK. Eva Longoria was the co-chair of Barack Obama’s campaign in 2012. But the other co-chair is the finance chair of the DNC. OK. Put that away in the back of your mind. Then he’s doing interviews on TV with the DNC logo behind his head. Kind of look when sometimes I do interviews and behind my head is the RNC logo. And then they move forward and they say we are going to endorse five candidates all Democrats. Turns out one of their endorsements is Charlie Crist who’s running against the first Latino lieutenant and governor as a ticket, you know, in Florida, that Florida has ever had with a Hispanic as the lieutenant governor in Florida.
VAN SUSTEREN: So, they’re partisan. Not really nonpartisan.
PRIEBUS: I mean, that goes beyond the pale.
VAN SUSTEREN: So, what — so, would you be content or happy if they just didn’t call themselves nonpartisan?
PRIEBUS: Well yeah, I mean, here is what we’re doing. I mean, at the Republican National Committee and I think Republicans out there in general, just kind of sick and tired of our party sitting around and doing nothing about the fact when people are purposefully and very openly, I think lying about what they are doing. Putting front groups out in front of the entire country. Claiming that they’re for everybody. When, in fact, it’s just a Democrat front group. I mean, look. Do you think they mentioned in their releases and in their documents the fact that the only two Hispanic governors in America happen to be Republicans and Susana Martinez in New Mexico and Brian Sandoval in Nevada? No. Did they mention probably the two most popular Hispanic politicians in our country right now which is Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio? No.
VAN SUSTEREN: Why is it, I mean, OK, I know this is a partisan group. I’ve seen her, it was Eva Longoria and I know that she’s long time Democrat. So, I assume the she is a Democrat and she’s not gonna promote Republican Latinos. But why is it that the, at least it appears that the Democratic Party seems to have the lack on the Latino vote?
PRIEBUS: Well, look, I mean, that goes back to what we’ve said as the Republican Party. We have to engage in a long-term year around operation to engage in Hispanic, African American, and Asian communities across the country.
VAN SUSTEREN: Are you doing that?
VAN SUSTEREN: What are you doing?
PRIEBUS: So, we are putting out a field organization in every single community across the country. On a four year basis across the country for all four years. And part of the problem is the Republican Party has become a party nationally that shows up about once every four years, five months before an election. This is the entire basis of our growth and opportunity project that we put together last year. In fact, today I was in Philadelphia announcing our Hispanic advisory counsel in Philadelphia. And something that we haven’t done enough of. But what I’m tired of and I think a lot of people are tired of are these sort of bogus organizations that pop up and they claim they’re nonpartisan. They file as a C4. Under the IRS code and then they go and do interviews in the studio of the DNC.
VAN SUSTEREN: Mr. Chairman, always nice to see you, sir.
PRIEBUS: All right. Thank you, Greta.
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