Laura Ali wants another term as Morris County Republican chair – and she wants it now.

Ali has called a sudden convention for this coming Saturday when she and her leadership team will seek reelection. All the terms don’t officially end until next June.

This bold – or perhaps audacious – move seems designed to do one thing: Reinforce Ali’s leadership by giving her a big vote of confidence.

It’s risky strategy on the surface. Whenever people vote, you can lose.

Then again, an opposition candidate would need to organize a campaign in a few days over the Fourth of July. That’s no easy chore. Those wanting to challenge Ali must make their intentions known by noon on Thursday.

All this is rooted in continuing – and sometimes hard to fathom – tensions and disagreement within the Morris GOP.

Politically, this is more important than Morris.

There aren’t all that many large Republican-leaning counties in the state. Morris is one of them – more or less. In short, a GOP gubernatorial candidate probably can’t win statewide without winning in Morris County.

Republican infighting there doesn’t help.

In 2021,  Ali proposed and the county committee created a “county line.” There was strong opposition to the line and while the line has now been around for three years, that opposition remains.

It was most pronounced during the just concluded primary when dissenters organized a campaign for four candidates – three state legislators and a county commissioner – who were running against those endorsed by the Morris GOP committee. In other words, running “off-line.”

Leading the opposition were John Sette, a former chair, and radio host Bill Spadea, a possible candidate for governor.

Primary day was a big win for Ali and her team. All the county endorsed candidates won comfortably.

But there was no peace.

Almost immediately, a new battle erupted in Parsippany, the county’s largest town, over the makeup of the township’s county committee.

The Morris County committee went to court claiming that 13 members of the Parsippany committee were appointed illegally. That is, the chair named them unilaterally.

Why is this important?

Parsippany Republicans, you see, are electing a new chairperson. The candidates are Jamie Barberio, the mayor, and Susy Golderer.

It also showed how fractious things are.

One of the plaintiffs in the suit was Justin Musella, a Parsippany councilman. One of the defendants was Dee dePierro, the current chair of the Parsippany GOP committee, and the wife of a township councilman.

After a court hearing last Friday, the 13 members were removed until the full committee can vote on them. So, the 13 individuals may wind up getting to the committee anyway.

Afterwards, both sides saw things in the ruling that they liked.

That drama, however, has now been eclipsed by Saturday’s scheduled convention.

Ali says in correspondence to the committee that her goal is to end the acrimony. She wrote the following:

“Unfortunately. over the weekend, many of you were bombarded with anonymous negative emails from a “concernedmorrisrepublicans’ email address of which many of you expressed displeasure. Also, during this past week, we had to take a small group to court to reverse illegal county committee appointments in Parsippany, which the judge ruled in the county committee’s favor within minutes, reversing the illegal appointments.

“There has also been a defamatory press release and crazy email allegations circulated filled with lies calling me names like a wanna-be ‘queen,’ calling me a liar and other libelous and untrue things. These allegations are simply wrong and false.

“At this point, I would like to put an end to this back and forth and resolve this for the good of our party. We need to make sure that every Republican wins on the local, county and state level this November. We also need to prepare for the presidential election cycle as well as the gubernatorial race in 2025.”

Ali’s hope is that an election for chair now – regardless of the outcome – will end the bickering and unify the party.

And as she notes, it will spare all involved a year of “anonymous emails, personal attacks, slanderous allegations and a very small, yet often loud, faction of people attacking the mainstream Morris County Republican Party.”

If the opposition truly is “very small,” Ali has nothing to worry about.