The California Republican Party wrapped up its annual spring convention by re-electing former state Sen. Jim Brulte, R-Rancho Cucamonga, to his third term as state chairman – but while also moving away from policies Brulte has touted to stands more attuned with President Donald Trump.

The leader of California Republicans since 2013, Brulte had gone along with conventional GOP wisdom – pre-Trump – about the need for his party to moderate its views on social issues and immigration. This led to the formal acceptance in Republican ranks in 2015 of a gay GOP group  – Log Cabin California – and to the adoption in 2016 of an immigration platform far removed from past conservative rhetoric.

But Sunday, resolutions touting key parts of Trump’s populist platform were embraced without debate by GOP delegates gathered at the Hyatt Regency Sacramento. Delegates supported a repeal of the Affordable Care Act by April 30, which marks 100 days in the White House for Trump; crackdowns on “sanctuary cities” that resist cooperation with federal immigration enforcement; and for citizens from seven mostly Muslim nations to be thoroughly investigated before being allowed to stay in the United States.

The resolutions were prepared with the help of Steve Frank, a past president of the California Republican Assembly and the state GOP’s parliamentarian for four terms, according to the Sacramento Bee.

Brulte upbeat, sees ‘long-term slog’ ahead

Brulte didn’t take the change of Republican focus as a rebuke and downplayed the idea that the state party was at low ebb, based on continuing Democratic dominance of state government and on Trump getting just 32 percent of California’s vote – the weakest showing by a major-party candidate in the Golden State since 1920.

The former GOP Assembly and Senate leader was upbeat in interviews.

“I’m actually excited about our prospects. We’ve spent a lot of money trying to figure out if there is a path forward. We believe there is. We believe we can elect a Republican governor in 2018,” Brulte told KQED. “I’ve always said one, two, three election cycles isn’t going to repair [the state party’s woes]. It is a long-term slog.”

Only two Republicans have won statewide office in California this century: Arnold Schwarzenegger in the 2003 gubernatorial recall of Gray Davis and in his 2006 re-election, and tech entrepreneur Steve Poizner as insurance commissioner in 2006, when he beat then-Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, who was widely disliked in Democratic circles for joining Schwarzenegger in challenging fellow Democrat Davis in the 2003 recall free-for-all.

The last Republican to come close to winning statewide office was in the 2010 race for attorney general. Then-Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley led then-San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris in early counts before Harris came on to win 46.1 percent to 45.3 percent – a 74,000-vote margin out of 9.6 million votes. Cooley didn’t concede until three weeks after election day, after Harris’ margin topped 50,000 votes.

Rep. Tom McClintock — a fierce critic of the Affordable Care Act — privately warned congressional Republicans at a party summit in Philadelphia last week that if they weren’t surefooted in repealing and replacing the landmark 2010 health care law, the GOP would pay a heavy price.

The Elk Grove lawmaker’s private warnings went public when a tape of the discussion was leaked to both the Washington Post and the New York Times.

According to the Post, McClintock said, “We’d better be sure that we’re prepared to live with the market we’ve created [with repeal of Obamacare]. That’s going to be called Trumpcare. Republicans will own that lock, stock and barrel, and we’ll be judged in the election less than two years away.”

The Times used the same quote. McClintock was the first person quoted in both accounts.

There was no response to the leaked tape and the coverage of it on McClintock’s House website or on his official Twitter account.

The seemingly worried tone is at odds with the reputation of bluntness, smarts and self-confidence that McClintock has established since being elected chairman of the Ventura County Republican Party at age 23 soon after graduating UCLA, then gaining a state Assembly seat at age 26. Now 60, McClintock’s political base has shifted to Northern California, where he pursued and narrowly won an open House seat in 2008 and has been easily re-elected ever since.

Congressman could be targeted in next redistricting

But his comments may reflect the reality that Democrats probably will have more influence over redistricting than Republicans in California after the 2020 census and are likely to draw boundaries meant to target vulnerable GOP incumbents. Elk Grove, 20 miles south of Sacramento, could easily be moved into a district with many more Democrats.

In 2010, state voters used Proposition 20 to take control of redistricting from the Legislature and gave it to a newly established, ostensibly nonpartisan state commission. But a 2011 ProPublica report laid out a stealth campaign by Democrats to create new districts favorable to their party. 

McClintock has been an unrelenting critic of the Affordable Care Act since it was first proposed in 2009. In an October 2013 speech on the House floor, he read excerpts of letters and emails from nine constituents who complained of being whipsawed by the health law.

“I would beg the president to read his correspondence and listen to the millions of Americans who are losing their affordable health insurance as a result of Obamacare: who are seeing their health care premiums skyrocket, or their hours cut back at work, or who are losing their jobs or the health plans they liked and that he promised they could keep,” the New York native said.

Besides McClintock’s worries about GOP lawmakers being saddled with a badly crafted “Trumpcare,” other Republicans heard on the tape expressed fears that there had been too much rhetoric about how easy it would be to come up with a better replacement. There was sharp criticism of a proposal to give households a large tax credit for health insurance because that would mean families would have to pay large premiums up front. Another concern was the shakiness of the GOP claim that its replacement would be sure to cost far less than the ACA.