Michael Steel to seek second term as RNC Chair

Michael Steel took a look at unemployement rates for black professionals and decided he better try and stay where he is.

Michael Steele stuns by running for reelection
Despite facing intense criticism from within his own party, Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele said Monday night he would mount a campaign for another two-year term atop the GOP.

Steele, breaking a monthlong silence about his intentions, acknowledged that he had “stumbled along the way” during the conference call with members of the RNC's 168-member governing board.

But in a defense of his tenure that stretched for 30 minutes before he announced his plans, Steele touted the party’s gains over the past two years in making a robust case for why he deserved to be elected to a second term when the party meets next month.

“[Critics] are talking a lot of trash about fundraising and talking a lot of smack about major donors,” Steele noted before pointing out that the committee had raised more this cycle than what the DNC did when they captured Congress in 2006.

He also sought to rebut those who’ve raised questions about transparency during his tenure, saying: “I’ve never tried to hide the ball from the members."

"I come to my bosses with a record that only you can judge, based upon directions you made clear to me from the very beginning,” Steele said in the message. “Yes, I have stumbled along the way, but have always accounted to you for such shortcomings. No excuses. No lies. No hidden agenda.”

Steele’s decision to go forward with a run comes after five Republicans have already declared their intention to take his job, two of whom worked with Steele at the committee.

Following his announcement Monday, some of his critics expressed exasperation at what will, at the very least, complicate the chairmanship race of a party that traditionally favors order and detests messy internal battles.

“Defying all logic, sensibility [and] political acuteness, Steele has decided to run!” wrote Massachusetts GOP committeeman Ron Kaufman in a blast e-mail. Source