Rockford Sun

In a letter to the Winnebago County Republican Party Central committee, party members have asked for a vote of no confidence in the county chairman, Eli Nicolosi, WIFR reported.

Among the criticisms are that the party's county headquarters haven't been used in a year although rent has been been paid, and that checks and deposits have been mishandled.

The letter said that Nicolosi has been writing checks for his state senate campaign out of the county party's checking account, and using unauthorized checks from the account with only Nicolosi's name and address on them, the story said.

Nicolosi is also accused in the letter of accepting campaign donations from Democrats. 

The list of complaints and the call for a no-confidence vote was disseminated by Rockford area Republican Austin Davies but because of the venue of the party meeting there was no discussion allowed, the WIFR story said.

  “Now, normally those meetings are held in private because they’re meetings of party, we conduct business at those meetings," Davies said, WIFR reported. "But since chairperson Eli Nicolosi has been at the helm, they’ve been held at various restaurants around the region.”     

Nicolosi is the current Winnebago County Republican Chairman and  is running for Illinois State Senate in the 35th District against  incumbent Dave Syverson. 

Regarding the letter of no confidence, Nicolosi states, "this is just a smear campaign. A lot of (the allegations) are baseless. A lot of them are political, I believe more so. We’re in  political season and I guess it’s starting a tad early." 

The letter to the central committee also accused Nicolosi of dictatorial leadership in violating Robert's  Rules of Order, the story said.