THE HILLSDALE CONSERVATIVES
Truth • Liberty • Local Stewardship
Hillsdale County, Michigan • Aug 18, 2026 • 2¢
Michigan’s Fifth Congressional District has developed a reputation for doing something increasingly uncommon inside political organizations:
It puts things on the record.
When disputes become uncomfortable, District 5 has repeatedly been willing to sign its name, take a vote, file the challenge, and force the issue back onto the table.
That pattern continued this week.
On August 17, Fifth District Chairman Benjamin R. Myers submitted a formal challenge to the Michigan Republican Party Credentials Committee concerning the Hillsdale County Republican delegation to the August 22 State Convention.
The filing is the latest step in a dispute District 5 has been involved with for years.
And once again, District 5 is not waiting for somebody else to deal with it.
District 5 Has Been Here Before
The Fifth District’s involvement with Hillsdale did not begin with the current convention.
In 2023, the district unanimously adopted the Stand With Hillsdale resolution, censuring Hillsdale Republican officials involved in the ongoing dispute.
The issue did not go away. In 2025 it again adopted the Stand With Hillsdale resolution.
District 5 remained involved as the conflict moved through later conventions, party committees, and internal proceedings.
In February 2026, the Michigan Republican State Committee took additional action involving Hillsdale County.
According to Myers’ current challenge, the State Committee adopted a settlement agreement on February 14 containing consequences if the Hillsdale County Republican Party failed to execute it.
By the March State Convention, the matter still had not been resolved.
Myers then led an effort from the convention floor seeking to enforce the State Committee action.
That effort failed.
The weak establishment argument raised at the time was that Hillsdale had not received adequate notice because of an “unexplained” delay.
Five months later, that excuse is much harder to make.
183 Days Later
Myers’ August 17 filing notes that 183 days had passed since the State Committee adopted the settlement agreement.
According to the challenge, Hillsdale County still had not executed it.
So Myers filed again.
His request is direct: enforce the State Committee action and suspend or revoke the credentials of the Hillsdale delegation until the agreement is executed.
There is nothing particularly complicated about the political significance of that move.
District 5 could have left the issue alone.
It did not.
It could have treated the March convention fight as the end of the matter.
It did not.
It could have allowed the issue to age quietly into another unresolved internal dispute.
It did not.
Instead, District 5 put the matter back in front of Credentials days before State Convention.
The Difference Is Follow-Through
Political organizations are very good at producing resolutions, committee reports, findings, motions, and agreements.
The harder part is what comes after.
Somebody has to remember what was adopted.
Somebody has to ask whether it was carried out.
And when it was not, somebody has to be willing to bring it back.
District 5 has been doing exactly that, year after year.
That has been one of the defining features of its involvement in the Hillsdale dispute.
It has not merely expressed concern.
It has taken formal action.
It has voted.
It has filed.
It has challenged credentials.
It has raised the issue from convention floors.
And it has continued doing so after the political attention moved somewhere else.
That is why this latest challenge matters.
Not because it is the first.
Because it is not.
While Others Stay Quiet
Internal political disputes create an obvious incentive to stay out of the way.
There are relationships to protect.
Future votes to consider.
Committee assignments.
Party positions.
People you will see at the next meeting and the meeting after that.
Silence is usually the safer option.
District 5 has repeatedly chosen not to take it.
The district has shown a willingness to put its position in writing and accept the consequences of doing so.
That is a meaningful distinction.
Especially in a dispute where one of the biggest complaints for years has been that problems were known but allowed to continue by the State Committee.
Two Challenges, One Convention
Myers’ filing also arrives while Hillsdale County is facing a separate credentials challenge concerning its precinct-delegate structure and representation.
The two challenges are based on different issues.
But their arrival at the same convention makes the larger situation difficult to ignore.
One challenge asks whether prior State Committee action will finally be enforced.
The other challenges the structure used to determine Hillsdale County’s convention representation.
Both now sit in front of the Party.
And once again, District 5 is in the middle of the fight.
Holding the Line
A cliché in politics.
In District 5’s case, it has become fairly literal.
The district has taken positions of accountability and continued holding them after the meeting ended.
After the convention ended.
After the controversy cooled.
After it would have been easier to move on.
Benjamin Myers’ August 17 filing is another example.
District 5 has again put its name behind a demand for accountability inside its own Party.
Others may agree with it.
Others may oppose it.
Others may continue saying nothing.
But District 5 has made sure nobody can say the issue was never raised.
It was raised.
It was documented.
It was brought back.
And once again, District 5 is holding the line.
in liberty,
Lance Lashaway
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