The next chair of the Republican National Committee will be Ronna Romney McDaniel, the niece of the 2012 presidential candidate Mitt Romney.



McDaniel was named deputy chair until her formal election in 2017.

In a statement sent out by the RNC on Wednesday, Trump said: “I’m excited to have a highly effective leader in Ronna McDaniel as RNC Deputy Chair and I look forward to her serving as the Party’s Chairman in 2017.”

“Ronna has been extremely loyal to our movement and her efforts were critical to our tremendous victory in Michigan, and I know she will bring the same passion to the Republican National Committee,” Trump added.

The statement did not use McDaniel’s full name, which she has invariably used professionally. The incoming RNC chair is Mitt Romney’s niece, the daughter of the former Massachusetts governor’s older brother Scott.

McDaniel supported Trump early in the race, breaking ranks with her uncle, who had been attacking the businessman as a “phony” and a “fraud” during the campaign. As the party’s chairwoman in Michigan, she helped deliver an unexpected and narrow victory in the state for Trump.

Weeks before election day, McDaniel ousted party activist Wendy Day from her elected position of grassroots vice-chair, because she refused to back Trump.

Bob Paduchik, a veteran Republican political operative in Ohio, who will serve as McDaniel’s co-chair at the RNC. Paduchik led the Trump campaign in the Buckeye state during the 2016 election and led George W Bush’s presidential campaigns there as well.

McDaniel appeared before Trump at a rally the president-elect held in Michigan on Friday. There, McDaniel mocked the failed recount efforts of the third-party candidate Jill Stein to a cheering crowd. “Until a day ago, Michigan was one of the states where Jill Stein was throwing her temper tantrum,” McDaniel said at the rally.

“Winning once was nice. But winning twice is huge.”

McDaniel will succeed Reince Priebus, whom Trump tapped to be his White House chief of staff. Priebus, the longest-serving RNC chair in GOP history, was first elected to the party post in 2011.

The announcement comes days after Trump selected the ExxonMobil CEO, Rex Tillerson, to be secretary of state over McDaniel’s uncle, Mitt Romney.

The RNC’s 168 members will formally vote on their party’s next chair at a meeting early next year but it is expected that Trump’s choice will be approved.