PENN ON THE HILL: GOP cuts off College Republicans

The Republican National Committee has withdrawn funding from the College Republican National Committee, according to Penn College Republicans President Dan Debicella. But the University club does not depend on the CRNC for money, Penn College Republicans Treasurer Amon Seagull said. Debicella, a Wharton junior and the Undergraduate Assembly chairperson, said the RNC stopped funding the CRNC because the college group's newsletter, The Broadside, had gotten far out of line with the Republican party platform. "It had a lot of articles that were anti-Republican," Debicella said. "They called for a new third party of conservative youth [and] attacked the Reagan/Bush legacy as not being conservative enough." He added that he felt the loss of funding was appropriate. "To have Republicans attacking the Reagan/Bush legacy just shows that these people weren't deserving of funding," he said. Seagull, a College and Engineering senior, said the University's group was fiscally independent of the CRNC. "We have absolutely no financial ties to the CRNC," he said. "All of our funding is from alumni support and member dues." Debicella said the CRNC was further right ideologically than the Penn College Republicans. "A lot of the people who are in charge of the CRNC are from the way far religious right," he said. "We like to think of ourselves as far to the economic right rather than the social right." Leaders of Republican organizations at other Ivy League schools also said the CRNC had little impact on their clubs. "We don't receive money from the CRNC, so it doesn't affect our funds," said Harvard University senior Bradford Campbell, president of the Harvard Republicans Club. Brown College Republicans President Peter Bogdanow said his group was not affected either. "We don't get any money from [the CRNC]," the Brown University junior said. "We get a lot of mail from them, but [the mail is not] essential to the daily functioning of the program."

Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The Daily Pennsylvanian.