Former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele charged on Wednesday that the GOP will have trouble reconciling its push for tougher voter registration laws with its minority outreach.
"How does Reince Priebus reconcile his approach and his agreement with voter registration policies that many in the black community view as anti-black, racist, whatever the term happens to be," Steele said on MSNBC.
An RNC post-campaign evaluation issued Monday calls for the GOP to engage in more substantive outreach to minorities, women and young voters. But Steele said that such outreach could clash with the GOP's policies.
"You've got to reconcile how people feel about your policies, not just the fact that you're going to show up. You can show up any time. It's what you say and what you do when you get there that matters most to people," he said.
Steele has criticized current RNC Chairman Reince Priebus and the report multiple times over the past week,
calling him and other Republicans "numbnuts" during one radio interview, in which he criticized the RNC's approach to reform.
On MSNBC, Steele defended his approach to minority and youth outreach, which attempted to
apply GOP principles to "urban-suburban hip-hop settings," he told the
Washington Times in 2009.
"You come in, and you put boots on the ground. You go out and you talk to people directly. And you expose the party in a way that is not traditional," he said on MSNBC.
"I argue taking the party outside of its comfort zone. A lot of members at the time thought that was a good idea until they realized this is going to require exposure on policy, exposure on principle, exposure on a lot of things that the party just didn't want to be exposed on."
