The NDGOP’s Keynote Speaker Is…Ryan Zinke?
Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, seen here in April, said that interior's funding of $11.6 billion for fiscal 2018, which is about $1.6 billion less annually, will eliminate programs that he says are unnecessary, duplicative or a low priority. MUST CREDIT: Washington Post photo by Jabin Botsford
There was sure a lot of build up in expectations over who the North Dakota Republican Party might book as the keynote speaker for their state convention this weekend.
They’d been sitting on the announcement for a while, but this afternoon they announced that the big headliner will be the, uh, Secretary of the Interior.
Here’s the release from the NDGOP:
I honestly thought the Republicans would get someone of a big more prominence for the convention. After all, Congressman Kevin Cramer is squaring off against incumbent Heidi Heitkamp in a Senate race with national implications. Heitkamp and the Democrats got former Vice President Joe Biden to their convention.
And Republicans get a relatively minor cabinet official? Also, there’s this:
ICYMI: FEC is asking Zinke’s former PAC to explain how $607,000 in previously unreported contributions for 1H 2017 suddenly showed up on its campaign filings. https://t.co/tqUJAzFQMg
— Ben Lefebvre (@bjlefebvre) April 3, 2018
To be fair, Vice President Mike Pence was just in the state to campaign for Cramer, and the consensus is that President Donald Trump hismelf will be hitting the campaign trail in North Dakota this year too. So maybe this doesn’t matter.
But still.
