GOP considers local outreach to blacks, Hispanics

Republicans will release the results of their post-election self-analysis next week, but a hint of the way forward may come from a meeting chairman Reince Priebus had Monday with African-American leaders in Brooklyn: A return by the national GOP to playing in local elections.

"We have to be a party that's community based, we can't just be a party that shows up three months before the election and expects to do well. We have to be an organization that embraces candidates at a local level,'' Priebus said in an interview Tuesday morning.

To do so may mean reviving the GOP's local election division, founded in the 1970s by then-Republican National Committee Chairman Bill Brock, to train local candidates and campaign staff, Priebus said. That would allow Republicans to begin "building a bench of African Americans and Hispanics that are running for things like city council and school board."

Priebus' visit to the Christian Cultural Center in Brooklyn, N.Y., on Monday was the last stop on his listening tour, part of the GOP's self-examination after losing the presidential election and failing to take a majority in the U.S. Senate last November.

The GOP has also acknowledged a big disadvantage in using technology to reach voters, track them and turn them out — and Priebus said local elections are good places to test new technology. "One of the issues that we have to do a better job with is testing our technology and our data before a major election. You can use the local elections as a place to do testing,'' he said.