Michael Under The Microscope

A member of the Republican National Committee's top panel will call for an investigation of RNC Chairman Michael S. Steele's spending, warning that "cronyism" dried up big-donor fundraising this year and now is jeopardizing major-donor fundraising for the 2012 GOP presidential nominating convention in Tampa, Fla.

Oregon RNC member Solomon Yue will call on the group's executive committee to freeze hiring and spending and review all RNC contracts.

"We know the RNC's big donors left us in this election cycle because Steele pocketed speaking fees and book royalties, and because he hired aides and friends - and paid them two to three times more than market value," Mr. Yue, an executive committee member and a founder of the Republican National Conservative Caucus, told The Washington Times.

"Steele has wasted donors' dollars on spending that had nothing to do with electing our House and Senate candidates on Nov. 2," he said.

Mr. Yue's call raised the 21-month-old insurgency within the Steele-led RNC to a new level of acrimony.

The controversy escalated amid revelations that Mr. Steele's longtime personal assistant Belinda Cook; her son, Lee Cook; and her sister, Betina Barcus, had rented a house in Tampa and spent hundreds of thousands of dollars negotiating and planning for the 2012 GOP convention - 25 months before the event.

Mr. Yue cited a Nov. 18 report in The Washington Times that Mr. Steele hired Mrs. Cook as "liaison" to the host city committee for the convention. The Times reported that Mr. Steele signed a contract awarding Mrs. Cook $15,000 a month plus a $25,000 "signing" bonus. The paper also reported that Mr. Steele put Mrs. Cook and a team of operatives in Tampa six months earlier than previous regimes.

RNC spending for Tampa through September exceeded $636,800 - or 18 times the total spent in a comparable period four years ago, based on data available on the Federal Election Commission website, The Washington Post reported on Saturday.

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