New York, January 28
Chandigarh-born Harmeet Dhillon has lost her bid to head the Republican National Committee (RNC) despite a spirited fight against the US party’s establishment that drew broad support.
The current RNC chair Ronna McDaniels was re-elected on Friday at the Committee’s meeting in California despite criticism for having led the party through three successive defeats and an underperformance.
Dhillon, who polled 51 votes to McDaniel’s 111 in the 168-member RNC, ran a grassroots campaign that brought out the discontent in the ranks of the party that must face a presidential election next year.
After the election, Dhillon said” “At the end of the day, if our party is perceived as totally out of touch with the grassroots, which I think some may take away from this outcome, we have some work to do.” The Republican Party has two high-profile women with roots in Punjab — Dhillon, who proudly broadcasts it with the Twitter handle “@pnjaban”; and Nikki Haley, the first Indian-American to be on the US Cabinet, who has said is “looking in a serious way” a run for the party’s presidential nomination.
