Rep. Duncan to speak at Center City Conservatives Republican Club

U.S. Rep John J. Duncan, Jr. will speak at the Center City Conservatives Republican Club during its monthly meeting on Aug. 25.

Club members will begin gathering at 5:45 p.m. at the Shoney's located at 4410 Western Avenue in Knoxville. The meeting begins at 6:30 p.m.

The groups Facebook page is RIGHT HERE. You also can follow on Twitter RIGHT HERE.

As always, shoot your political stuff my way for publication consideration.

GOP to hold election rally on Monday

Knox County Republicans are invited to join in a pre-election rally on Monday.

The event, which starts at 5 p.m., will include a number of officeholders and candidates running in the Aug. 4 election.

The Knox County Republican Party and the West Knox Republican Club are partnering in this combined “Get Out The Vote” rally, and the club’s annual cake auction fundraiser, according to a release.

The event will include free hamburgers, hot dogs, and "all the fixin’s at our indoor picnic" at Rothchild’s Catering and Conference Center.

Those who attend also can participate in the bidding for cakes provided by candidates and elected officials.

Williams seeking GOP delegate seat

From Susan Williams: As you know, the Tennessee primary for selecting the Republican nominee for President of the US is on March 1 and early voting begins this week, Feb. 10.

It is a long ballot with the presidential candidates all listed first and then the delegates who are running for the candidates are listed below those names, beginning with the delegates running statewide first and following those names you will find the names of folks running in the Second Congressional district as delegates.

I am one of those! Since I am running as a delegate committed to Jeb Bush, I think my name is fourth under the Second Congressional District list.

The really interesting thing is that you don't have to vote for Jeb Bush (even though I would like you too) to vote for me as a delegate.

You can vote for Kasich or Trump or Rubio or anyone who's still standing on March 1 and still vote for me for delegate.

I would greatly appreciate it! I've been to 7 Conventions and feel very qualified to represent Tennessee well. Thanks for your help!

(As always, shoot the ol' Porch your political stuff for publication consideration.)

John Kasich to serve as keynote speaker as GOP Lincoln Day Dinner

(Photo: Chip Somodevilla, 2016 Getty Images)

Presidential candidate Ohio Gov. John Kasich will be the featured guest speaker for this year's Knox County Republican Party's annual Lincoln Day Dinner.

The fund-raising event is set for Feb. 27 at Rothchild Catering & Conference Center on Kingston Pike, according to Knox County GOP Treasurer Nick McBride.

Tickets are $35 and reserved tables, which can seat 10, are $1,000. The center can hold 1,200 people.

Tickets will be available on a first come, first serve basis starting Thursday, and folks can buy them from Republican office holders and GOP party leaders.

The Lincoln Day Dinner is an annual Knox County GOP fund-raising event.

“To be able to do this before the Super Tuesday primary, I’m just excited to do it,” said Knox County GOP

Chairman Buddy Burkhardt.” Even if Kasich is not in the race by then, he will be able to stump for the man he supports."

Burkhardt said he expects an appearance from a  "big name" like Kasich  to help generate interest here in Tennessee for the state’s March 1 election.

Last year, the Lincoln Day Dinner featured Haley Barbour, former chairman of the Republican National Committee and former Mississippi governor.

The event also has featured former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert (R-Illinois), former U.S. Sen. Fred Thompson (R-Tennessee), former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (R-Georgia) and U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina).

Trump in town tonight, but not asking for help from state or local GOP

Republican presidential candidate and real estate billionaire Donald Trump is running in a traditional party with what many would describe as a nontraditional campaign.

Trump is scheduled to speak in Knoxville at 7tonight at the Knoxville Convention Center, but he is reportedly not using help from the county and state GOP.

Ryan Haynes, the Tennessee GOP chairman, and Buddy Burkhardt, the Knox County GOP chairman, said they both found out about the event through the Internet.

"I found out through Facebook, which obviously is a very non-traditional way of finding these things out," Haynes said. "A lot of the campaigns have contacted us directly when they're coming to town."

Full story RIGHT HERE.

Hatfield backs Haynes for GOP chair

Looks like Ryan Haynes has at least one supporter in his bid for the Tennessee Republican Party chair seat. (Actually, he has quite a few supporters.)

Anyhoo, in a letter sent today to SEC members, District 6 party rep Ted Hatfield noted:

I wanted to write you today to tell you a little about my friend Ryan Haynes. I have had the pleasure to get to know Ryan over the last several years and witness firsthand his maturity, work ethic, and commitment to the Republican Party.

Ryan has worked countless hours not only in his own campaigns but assisted in the efforts of many other conservative candidates over the years. I have also had the pleasure to see his leadership qualities as he Chairs the Knox Co. Delegation of the legislature.

When Ryan gets involved in something he really goes all in as he has shown with his commitment to resign from the legislature if elected Chair. He has the ability to connect with many different types of people on many different levels and will make a great leader of this party. I hope you will join me in supporting Ryan Haynes for Party Chair on April 11th.

In addition to Ryan, Memphis radiologist George Flinn, state Rep. Mary Littleton, R-Dickson; Rebecca Burke of Williamson County; and former Davidson County GOP Chairwoman Kathleen Starnes are vying for the seat.

Burkhardt picked to lead Knox GOP

Buddy Burkhardt

The Knox County Republican Party picked Buddy Burkhardt to serve as its chairman for the next two years.

Burkhardt, who works in technical support at the Knox County Sheriff's Office, succeeds Ruthie Kuhlman.

In addition, the GOP during its reorganizational meeting last Saturday at Crown College also picked Suzanne Dewar to serve as vice chair, and former county Commissioner Michele Carringer to serve as secretary.

"I am focusing on the future and I believe that a strong, conservative Republican Party is good for the citizens and prosperity of Knox County," Burkhardt said.

He added that at this point he wants to "move the party forward," and update the group's website and its Facebook page.

Burkhardt said he wants to promote candidate appearances, fundraisers and contact information for candidates and elected officials.

"I want it so that people can contact them directly and easily," he said.

The new chairman also wants to focus on creating a grassroots effort to get more residents involved in the party. He said key to that would be seeking help from the party's precinct leaders which would "give them a stronger sense of involvement."

"I want to get those people more involved in making phone calls and helping candidates in their precincts," he said. "Candidates are always looking for people to work the polls for them. I want to try to try to get a grassroots efforts going, because if people feel they are more involved, then they will be more involved."

The major local election this year is for the Knoxville mayoral seat, currently held by Madeline Rogero, a Democrat who announced her intentions Monday night on Twitter to seek re-election.

The post is non-partisan, but Burkhardt said "we know who the Democrats and Republicans are, and we can get involved and support our Republicans."

He said local GOP officials are looking for someone to potentially challenge Rogero, and talking about ways to raise money.

Next year, the county will have a couple major seats up for re-election, including the property assessor's post and the law director position. In addition, about half of the county commission seats are open.

The Knox County Democratic Party will hold its reorganizational convention March 28 at the CWA union hall.

Local GOP Party inside baseball

Brian Hornback, the great agitator of all things related to Scripps and the News Sentinel, published a few interesting posts recently on is blog about some inside baseball going on in the Knox County Republican Party and its move to reorganize.

Now, I did hear a week or so back that the reorganization was set for next Friday, also the day that the school kids will be on Spring Break and the building will be closed. I guess they’ll just pay a janitor to show up in let them in. Or not.

Anyway, I confess to not knowing all the intricacies about what’s going on, so you should probably check out his post here.

Local GOP Party chairman Ray Jenkins also posted a note here on the organization's website.

(By the way, what's up with excluding county Law Director Joe Jarret - a Republican - from the site? All the other local Republican officeholders are on there, even a few I think are really Democrats in disguise.)

Anyhoo, a few days later the Scripps agitator talked about a TN GOP probe into the local Republican Party for possible bylaw violations in this post. It all has something to do about when a meeting was supposed to be advertised in the KNS.

He wrote:

“It is clearly 3 days late of the TN Republican Party bylaws. State Chairman Chris Devaney has referred this item to the bylaws committee. It seems that the spin to Chairman Devaney is that the News Sentinel delayed publishing the notice.”

Even Hornback, who can’t stand the paper, says this is crap.

I’ve got to agree.

We need the money.

Heh.

So we’ll publish a legal ad as soon as possible. We don’t like losing customers.

Although I’m sure there are plenty of folks out there who would argue with me on that one.

On a side note, I'm not a big fan of just linking to other blogs without doing my own research first. But it's Sunday night and I just ate a bunch of horse tranquilizers, so I'm lazy.

Kidding.

Or not.