Ronna Romney McDaniel, Mitt Romney’s Niece, Elected Republican National Committee Chair

LANSING – Ronna Romney McDaniel, named by President-elect Donald Trump as his choice to become the Republican National Committee chair, was elected to that post Thursday in Washington, D.C.

McDaniel was elected one day before Trump is sworn in as president. She succeeds Reince Priebus, who will become Trump’s chief of staff.

Addressing the Republican National Committee after she was elected, McDaniel promised to help the party “grow, expand and deliver results” as it moves ahead under total elected control of the national government.

McDaniel was elected chair of the national party fewer than two years after she was elected chair of the Michigan Republican Party. She was elected to lead the state party in February 2015, succeeding Bobby Schostak.

She will continue to serve as the state party chair until her successor is elected at the party’s winter convention on February 11, a party spokesperson confirmed. Running to replace her is Scott Hagerstrom, who chaired Trump’s campaign in Michigan, and former party chair Ron Weiser.

Hagerstrom announced his intention to challenge McDaniel for the chair’s post before Trump tapped her to become national chair.

McDaniel gained national party recognition as Trump became the first Republican in 28 years to win Michigan – by a little more than 10,000 votes – over Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.

Part of that recognition came from the fact she worked hard for Trump, while her uncle, 2012 Republican Presidential Candidate Mitt Romney, did not support him. It was during the 2012 campaign and her work for Romney that McDaniel became a leading light in the state party, which helped her win the post of national committeewoman – a post her mother, Ronna Romney, held for a number of years.

McDaniel is the third Michigander to chair the national party. The first was U.S. Sen. Zachariah Chandler from 1876-79 when the party was beginning to come out of its more radical days following the Civil War. The second was former General Motors executive Arthur Summerfield, who was the national chair from 1952-53 and was named U.S. Postmaster General by former President Dwight Eisenhower, where he embarked on a somewhat controversial and not terribly successful effort to curb pornography through the mail.

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