In the wake of the Republican sweep in the 2024 election, Volusia County’s Republicans are under new management, while a Deltona woman’s lawsuit against the immediate past chair for alleged discrimination gains ground.

The two stories are connected, in that the former county party chief and an aggrieved member of the party hierarchy are the center of attention.

First, Paul Deering is now out as chair of the Republican Executive Committee of Volusia County. The new chief, or chair, is Mary Ann Pistilli of New Smyrna Beach. Though he no longer chairs the Republican Executive Committee of Volusia County, Deering said he intends to remain an active member of the local group.

Sensing he no longer enjoyed the support of a majority of the body, Deering stepped down during a special REC meeting in Daytona Beach Saturday, Dec. 14. The purpose of the meeting was to elect county party officers for the next four years. 

“Paul Deering announced that he would not stand for re-election,” Volusia County State Republican Committeeman Vic Baker told The Beacon.

Baker said Deering acknowledged the trouble involving Rosa Campbell’s federal discrimination case and repercussions from certain of the REC’s endorsements before the Aug. 20 primary.

In a bizarre on-off-on-again, Deering had called the meeting a few days before, but then he abruptly canceled it. Word of the sudden change in meeting plans reached the Republican Party of Florida’s headquarters in Tallahassee, Baker explained.

“We got notice Thursday afternoon that the meeting was still on, because you cannot cancel a meeting without notice,” Baker told The Beacon. “Paul canceled the meeting, but he was overruled by the RPOF.”

The Volusia County REC meeting took place at the Daytona International Raceway. The gathering was closed to the public and the media, but partisans attending related the business transacted. 

The meeting lasted roughly three hours, Baker said.

“We have 450 people listed on the executive committee. I would say we had about 300 [present],” he added.

In a telephone conversation with The Beacon, Deering described the change in the County party leadership. 

“While we may have some philosophical differences, I believe we want to elect Republicans,” he said.

Ronald Reagan is my model. Reagan said we have a big tent,” Deering added. “We all can’t be ringmaster at the same time. She [Pistilli] is the ringmaster.”

Pistilli, Baker said, is well-known for her work in campaigning for President Donald Trump, noting she had “knocked on 300,000 doors” while canvassing for his election.

Also elected as leaders of the REC were Duncan DeMarsh, vice chair; Cathy DiBernardino, secretary; and John Reid, treasurer.

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Rosa Campbell, herself a Republican stalwart, has filed a civil action against Paul Deering, now the former chair of the county’s Republican Executive Committee. 

“It’s racism, prejudice and actual discrimination suddenly and then apparently, you know, where it’s manifested in front of individually from a group of people to 300-plus people,” she said.

Campbell is herself a member of the REC — whom she also names as another defendant in her civil case.

Noting the prejudice against her has increased over the past few years, Campbell described a 2018 party meeting in Deltona attended by Deering.

“He racially expressed the makeup of the people in there, and he referred to me as ‘the token Black.’ I was shocked. So I really didn’t know where to go from there, what to do at that time, and so forth. I actually reclused myself from talking to anyone, talking to him and a few other people at the time, a few years, four years at that time,” she added.

The tension between Campbell and Deering escalated, and she tells of being expelled from and was expelled from a REC meeting in June, called in advance of the then-upcoming Aug. 20 primary.

“We were having a meeting for endorsements,” Campbell said, “and I was singled out amongst over 300 people, and there were many other people doing the same actions I was doing, and it was a discrimination case, and I was escorted out of the meeting by a sheriff, and my voting rights were taken away, being unable to vote for the other candidates for endorsements.”

The deprivation of her rights to vote on endorsements and other party matters, Campbell alleges, is a violation of the 15th Amendment, which conferred voting rights on all Americans, regardless of race or national origin, and a violation of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

The suit is now pending in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida. 

Campbell is asking for a jury trial and $75,000 in compensatory damages, along with payment of her attorneys’ fees and court costs.

A trial date has not yet been set, but Judge Robert M. Norway may order the two sides to seek to mediate their differences and head off a courtroom battle.

In any event, Campbell says she is going to court on principle.

“I’m taking a stand not just for myself, but for everyone who says these types of actions have prevented many others stereotyped from coming into our party,” she said. “And I want everyone to know the stereotype is not everyone; it’s one individual that causes dissension among many.”

Campbell says her case is now in the discovery phase, and she is under legal advice to restrict her comments on the pending matter.