Reports: RNC's new Trump-backed team orders mass layoffs

• The RNC voted for the Trump-backed Michael Whatley to become chair and the former president's daughter-in-law Lara Trump to be co-chair on Friday, some eight months before the 2024 election.

Driving the news: "Chairman Whatley is in the process of evaluating the organization and staff to ensure the building is aligned with his vision of how to win in November," wrote new RNC chief operating officer Sean Cairncross in an email first reported by Politico.

• "During this process, certain staff are being asked to resign and reapply for a position on the team."
• Political, data and communications staffers were among those affected by the layoffs, according to multiple reports.
• Chris LaCivita, a Trump campaign adviser who's the RNC's new chief of staff, said the job cuts represented "Republicans streamlining" in order to avoid any doubling up between the committee and Trump campaign so they're basically functioning as one, per AP.

What they're saying: Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) wrote on X: "MAGA is now in control of the Republican Party!! We will continue to need everyone's help all the way across the finish line!"

• Charlie Kirk, who leads the pro-Trump youth group Turning Point USA, in a post to X celebrated the "Bloodbath at the RNC" as "excellent," adding: "The anti-Trump sleeper cells all have to go. The RNC is getting ready to win."

• Representatives for the RNC did not immediately respond to Axios' requests for comment.

The other side: Moderate Republicans, including former Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) expressed alarm at the firings.

• "The RNC, in deciding to become Trumps toilet and slush fund, is going to do real damage to down ballot races," he wrote on X. "They deserve it for capitulating How far they have fallen."

Go deeper: Trump's team hires lawyer to "watch the money" at RNC