Live from Music Row, Friday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed the candidate for the Davidson County Republican Party Chair, Lonnie Spivak in studio to discuss his endorsements and how to register for the election on Saturday.
Leahy: In studio, our very good friend, Lonnie Spivak, Davidson County residents. For many years you worked in marketing and graphic design advertising. That’s been your career.
Spivak: That’s been my career, yes.
Leahy: And you are a candidate for chairman of the Davidson County Republican Party. I’ve known you for many, many years. We’ve worked on innumerable projects, and I have endorsed you for the chairmanship. I’ve never endorsed anybody for a local office in the history of this program.
Spivak: I know. That makes me feel really special, too.
Leahy: You are really special because you get a lot of things done. But Lonnie, what I’m interested in, tell people where they can go to pre-register for this meeting tomorrow, where the Davidson County Republican Party will elect a new chairman.
You can go to votegopnashville.com. It’ll bring you to a very short form where they’ll get your name, your address, and stuff, and then they’ll look at your voting record and make sure you voted in at least three of the four statewide primaries.
Leahy: And if you’re there, don’t worry about it. Just go in. And here’s the thing I would say about this. If you’re not sure, had I voted in three of the last four statewide elections, don’t worry about it. Sign up, and go there. And here’s the thing. Even if you, like, voted in two or four and you you’re not and that for some for this technical reason, you’re not able to vote.
That’s not really the important thing. Voting is important in the election of the chairman, but we want to have people come there who are willing to work and be part of this effort to get conservative candidates out there in Davidson County.
Spivak: And if you haven’t met all the exact criteria, there’ll be a process too where there’ll be people who will be able to vouch for you and stuff and get you in.
Leahy: Yes. This is consistent with the Republican Party bylaws. But just show up and go with the flow.
Spivak: That’s going to be important. There’s a lot of new energy in Nashville. There are a lot of people moving in. Over 200 people have registered to attend so far. So it’s going to be a great turnout. It’ll be a quick event, just a couple of hours, really, to get the new board elected, and then we’ll hit the ground running.
Leahy: Go through the process. And I’m just going to say we’re not going to get into the details of this, but what an opportunity that is right in front of us when a week and a half ago, Mayor John Cooper announced that he was not running for re-election.
Spivak: That’s because you called him mean names too.
Leahy: That’s why. We know the reason that John Cooper decided he wouldn’t run for reelection is that I called him some mean names earlier that day.
Spivak: That’s exactly right.
Leahy: But now he’s not running, so I don’t need to call him mean names. But the important part about this is the opportunity, and let me just frame this. You can’t win a race unless you show up. You got to show up.
And generally speaking, if you don’t show up, that’s a problem. And I think if you are elected tomorrow, you have a whole plan for showing up and for conservatives to show up in Nashville, Davidson County.
Spivak: I’ve got a seven-point plan for how I want to attack the chairmanship.
Leahy: And let me add. Our friend, the outgoing chairman of the Davidson County Republican Party, Jim Garrett, has also endorsed you.
Spivak: And that was a big surprise that that happened, but I’m happy to get support wherever I can get him.
Leahy: We know Jim. Good guy, and his endorsement of you, I think, is a very significant thing. You’ve been endorsed by yours truly and by Jim Garrett. And the election is tomorrow.
Spivak: And it’s tomorrow.
Listen to today’s show highlights, including this interview:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “Lonnie Spivak” by Lonnie Spivak. Background Photo “Davidson County Courthouse” by euthman. CC BY-SA 2.0.
Live from Music Row, Friday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed Davidson County Republican Party chairman candidate Lonnie Spivak in studio to talk about his seven-point plan and the hope that he can hand over his blueprint to the Young Republicans.
Leahy: In studio, Lonnie Spivak running for chairman of the Davidson County Republican Party. I’ve endorsed Lonnie. Jim Garrett, the outgoing or the current chairman of the Davidson County Republican Party, has endorsed Lonnie.
Lonnie, where do people go to sign up for this?
Spivak: You can go to votegopnashville.com, and it’ll bring you to a forum where you can pre-register for the event, but you don’t need to register to show up.
Leahy: And show up. It’s tomorrow morning at 9:00 a.m. Tell us where.
Spivak: 9:00 am at the Millenium Maxwell House Hotel. I’d say maybe get there a little early. It may take a minute to get people in and check all their credentials.
Leahy: The big vote! Lonnie, you promised a seven-point plan, and basically, it means we’re here. The GOP is showing up in Davidson County, and elections will not be uncontested. Tell us your plan.
Spivak: One thing we can all agree on is what we’ve been doing in Davidson County as a Republican Party hasn’t been working. So the number one point on my plan is to rethink how the organization operates at every level.
I’ve got meetings set up, assuming I win on Saturday, to go through everything that we’re doing so we can examine what’s worked, and what hasn’t, and go from there. We will review and possibly adjust the current makeup of the executive committee.
Leahy: How many people are on the executive committee? This is point number two.
Spivak: Point number two. I think there are around 15 members who are appointed through the convention, but then there are also all the SEC members.
Leahy: State executive committee members.
Spivak: There are members, state executive committee members, and then there are voting members from the federated auxiliary group, such as the Republican Women and YRs and stuff. And so it’s really a very big executive committee, and we need to look at that structure and see if that’s what makes sense.
Leahy: But the executive committee plays a role to help implement the plan.
Spivak: Right. We need to be an organization that gives the ancillary groups an umbrella to sit under. We need to improve the definition of what it means to be a Republican in Nashville. There are so many people moving in.
And to be a bona fide Republican right now, you have to vote in three of the four statewide primaries, which makes it very hard for them to participate. And that’s something we’ll have to work with the state and the executive committee on. We need to improve our fundraising by reconnecting with the business community and the grassroots to improve active membership and community outreach.
Leahy: With the business community. What number is that out of the seven?
Spivak: That is number five. Number six is we just need to build a better understanding of the population of Nashville.
Leahy: Well, that’s interesting. I moved our family moved from California to Davidson County in 1991. We moved to Williamson County in 1997. I lived in Davidson County for six years. Let me just tell you something. Davidson County in 1991 was very different from Davidson County in 2023.
Spivak: If we remember, the Republicans have really controlled the state since 2010. There have been so many people moving into Nashville with the great migration, as Roger Simon talks about…
Leahy: From California, Illinois, and New York. And by the way, if you live in a blue state, you’re going to get out of there if you got a brain, right?
Spivak: I can plot on a map where people who have voted in the primary lives, but that doesn’t really tell me much because their voter turnout is so low. So we really need to have a better understanding of where the people who are moving here have moved, what their party affiliation is, and what their demographics are, and then that will help us build a structure to pick points where we can win elections.
Leahy: I would guess if you look at the population of Davidson County, the number of people that have moved into Davidson County from 1990 to 1991, it’s probably more than half of the people living in Davidson County that have moved since moved there since 1991 and since the past five years. It’s huge.
Spivak: And if you look at Florida as an example, all the millions or so people that have moved, only like 17,000 of those have registered as Democrats in the state of Florida.
Leahy: Do we have a sense of the new arrivals here in Nashville, let’s say in the last five years? Of course, we don’t have party registration for this state, but if you vote in the primaries, that’s what the party takes as your affiliation.
Spivak: I’m told that the state party has data that they can share with us. As of yet, the county party has not taken any advantage of the data that is available by the state. I’ve spoken to the gentleman who’s responsible for maintaining the data for the state party, and we’ve scheduled some time to talk.
Leahy: Data. Data as opposed to (Inaudible talk)
Spivak: We’re going to be very data-driven. It’ll give us a really good idea of where we’ll have an opportunity for pickups, and where we can recruit the best candidates. And this is going to be an incremental process for people who think we got a new chairman.
We’re going to do things new. This is not going to be an overnight process. We’re going to have to build some infrastructure in order to win elections. And as I told you last time, Michael, I only tend to do this for one term.
Leahy: How long is the term?
Spivak: It’s two years. And so I hope to have a great blueprint on how to be successful in Nashville, and then I’ll hand it over to some more younger, more energetic people who are willing to take the ball and run with it.
Leahy: So younger, more energetic. The older I get, the more I appreciate the young. And we have a group here, the Young Republicans here, they’re pretty active.
Spivak: They’re very active. Their membership has grown over the last several years. They held their reorganization meeting the other night at the Bold Patriot. It was a great turnout, and the new leadership is excited and ready to hit the ground running.
I really look forward to working with the Young Republicans, and we really need foot soldiers in Nashville, and I’m hoping that the Young Republicans will help be those.
Leahy: They’ve got the energy, for sure. Did we get to your seventh point?
Spivak: The seventh point, it’s just become more active in local politics. We’re going to start commenting on things. You will see press releases from me and the county party, and we will just be more visible and put out more opinions where the people of Davidson County know what the position of the local party is.
Leahy: And again, the election is tomorrow, and this is what would happen if you win that election tomorrow.
Spivak: If I win the election.
Leahy: And I would say it’s looking good, but in any election, your friends have to show up.
Spivak: I feel really good about where I am. I’ve met so many great people. I’ve received a broad range of support, and I’ve been endorsed by Michael Patrick Leahy.
Leahy: That’s me! I’ve endorsed you. And Jim Garrett.
Spivak: And Jim Garrett. I really think that we’re going to have a great turnout. It’ll be a great time, and then it’ll be fun and exciting to be a Republican in Nashville in the near future.
Leahy: Where do they sign up?
Spivak: They go to votegopnashville.com to pre-register.
Leahy: And where is the event tomorrow at 9:00 a.m.?
Spivak: It is at the Millennium Maxwell House Hotel on Rosa Parks.
Leahy: I have a vision for the future. We get some of these YRs to be part of the executive committee. You turn it around for two years, and then one of these YRs jumps in with vigor and energy and keeps the ball moving forward.
Spivak: That’s what I’m hoping for.
Leahy: We can hope.
Listen to today’s show highlights, including this interview:
– – –
Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “Lonnie Spivak” by Lonnie Spivak. Background Photo “Davidson County Courthouse” by Luckiewiki. CC BY-SA 4.0.
Live from Music Row Thursday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – official guest host Ben Cunningham welcomed newly elected GOP chair for Davidson County Jim Garrett to the newsmakers line to discuss his priorities moving forward and his optimism for conservatives.
Cunningham: We’ve got a great guest now, and it’s a guy that has a big challenge. Jim Garrett is the newly re-elected chair of the Davidson County Republican Party. Jim, good morning.
Garrett: Good morning, Ben. Good morning, Grant. How are you all?
Cunningham: We’re doing great. Thanks so much for getting up early with us. We really appreciate it.
Garrett: Since I’ve retired a couple of years ago, I have generally taken the sixth and the seven off of my clock. (Cunnigham chuckles) Well, we are doubly impressed that you’re with us.
Thanks so much and congratulations on the re-election. I think the term is the reorganization was this weekend and you were elected chair of the Davidson County Republican Party. And congratulations on that.
Garrett: Thank you very much. Thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you.
Cunningham: I know you are a dedicated conservative. And being a dedicated conservative in Davidson County is not an easy job because Davidson County is one of the blue counties that conservative Republicans in Tennessee, you have to deal with and along with Shelby County and a few others. But Davidson and Shelby are the two biggies.
What is it like being the chair of the Republican Party in a blue County? What are the challenges you guys are facing?
Garrett: The challenges we face are those very similar to what the Republicans across the country they’re facing. We’ve got a very energized opposition. The Democrat Party is very energized here in Davidson County.
They are somewhat organized and they’re in charge. So they killed us with COVID. Our reorganization normally would have happened in the first quarter of an odd number of years. We do it every two years.
But because of what John Cooper and his Health Department were doing, we had to postpone and postpone and postpone and finally got it done in May much later than we would have normally done it.
Cunningham: I hadn’t even thought about that. All the code restrictions affected, obviously, your ability to come together, didn’t it?
Garrett: We couldn’t have more than eight people for most of our meetings. So we’ve been doing Zoom meetings the last several months we have been in person, but we did spend all 2020 year in Zoom meetings meeting every month for our executive committee. And the restrictions, yes, they hurt us quite a bit.
Henry: Hey, Jim. Grant Henry here. I have a question based on reports I’ve been reading in reports and you get this general sense and an almost palpable feeling that there’s a conservative resurgence happening here in Middle Tennessee.
Tomi Lahren moved to town. Candace Owens lives here now. Ben Shapiro up and moved the entire Daily Wire crew and 85 employees to Nashville. You get this feeling almost that for some of the under 40 conservatives it’s the place to be in this happening city?
Do you think that’s going to have an impact at all on how the GOP operates in Davidson County? Or is that just a little bit too naive of me?
Garrett: It is not naive at all. On my end of the telephone, I get three or four calls a day from people wanting to get involved. Our website gopnashville.org has got buttons on there for volunteering and contributing.
But the volunteer button three or four times a day. I’ll get an email from the website saying that this person or that person wants to do it. And it’s just fun to watch. Of the 14 members that we elected to the office of the executive committee this time, five of us there are 15.
But five of us are returning people who’ve been around for a while. 10 of them, though, are people relatively new to Davidson County. They’ve got a great experience where they did live in the Republican Party.
They work with state legislators, state offices. They were chairman of their parties out in California, up in New York, Wisconsin, Illinois, Georgia. And they bring with them a vast experience. And energy that I haven’t seen before here in Davidson County. I’m excited. I’m not excited a bit awed of where I think we can go and what we can do.
Cunningham: Jim, the people talk all the time about the Metro Council and the fact that basically is, except for Steve Glover and a few others, it is pretty much a bastion of the far left. How do we crack that nut, so to speak?
Garrett: We have a chance right now. We’re going through that here in the state with the 2020 census and the redistricting. We’re looking at redistricting. I set out the beginning of this year with four objectives basically based on each quarter.
My first quarter was the reorganization. We got that done late, but we got it. The second quarter is working with the General Assembly on redistricting for our state House seats here in Davidson County and our state senate seats here in Davidson County.
But then recruiting candidates in the third quarter for 2022 and in training those candidates in the fourth quarter for 2022. But that brings us to 2023. And again, we’ll go through a redistricting for 2023 and the council race.
We are going to be working to try to get lines drawn that would give us a chance in certain areas. We have good Republican people here. Trump got 100,000 votes or something like that in Davidson County.
So we’ve got a body of people. They’re also silent. They’re also quiet. They’ve been beaten down, but I think if we can energize them, the council race will change. I don’t expect this to get a majority of 21 people out of that 40.
I don’t expect that at all, but I would like to see us get 10 to 15 solid Republicans in there. And if we do that, we can certainly change what this Metro Council does what direction they go.
Henry: Jim, you may have just answered this question with that statement you just made, but if someone were to call in, if they’re listening right now, if they’re thinking, Hey, I just moved to Davidson County and I want to get involved in local GOP group.
What’s your top priority issue? What’s the thing you need them to work on the most? What do you need the most help with right now? Is it those council races?
Garrett: No. Council races are 2023. It’s 2022 that we are focused on right now, and we need candidates for state House. We need some representation in the state house here, and we’ve got 10 state House seats and none of them are a Republican right now, and we’ve got to change that. So our next main focus will be candidates for the 2022 race.
Henry: Jim, do you see any one seat more vulnerable than the others say within Davidson County at the state house level?
Garrett: There are some seats that are not vulnerable at all, and we probably won’t touch them. But there are other seats that are. You’ve got five who have decided not to run again. That seat is going to be uncontested.
I think Bo Mitchell in House seat 50 is at risk. The people out there don’t like Bo. Bo is the only legislator that I’ve been down to the capital that has actually got up and walked out of his office. He insulted me at a time.
And I just got up and walked out of the meeting with him. That man is an evil man, in my opinion, but I think he’s vulnerable out there. There’s probably a couple of others.
Cunningham: Obviously, Mayor Cooper has been a disappointment. A lot of conservatives had faith in him that he would be a fiscal conservative, but that faith has been completely blown away.
Garrett: Oh, absolutely. I was at a friend’s house when we had to get together and Cooper was there talking about how conservative he was and it was a bi-partisan race and that he’s basically a conservative.
And then the first thing he does out of the pot is to raise our taxes 34 or 37 percent depending on where you live. I think Cooper right now with this referendum that’s going on, is scared to death that it will pass and we will get that voter list and get the voter numbers turned down because he’s vulnerable for a recall. And I do believe he is vulnerable for a recall.
Cunningham: Well, Jim, we are up against the break. Give us that website one more time if you would before we leave.
Garrett: Gopnashville.org.
Listen to the full second hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “Davidson County Republican Party” by Davidson County Republican Party.
