Polk County Republican Party co-chair Chad Brown has resigned his office and switched his voter registration to no-party, Kathie Obradovich reported for the Des Moines Register today. Click through to read his resignation letter to the Polk GOP Executive Committee, which is as damning as any focus group comments or “autopsy” I’ve seen. Brown pointed out that Republicans have lost ground in Polk County, not just in the city of Des Moines but even in the suburbs. He has concluded that “we are now headed in the wrong direction on several fronts” and that he would only be “enabling” to help “a dysfunctional Party that does not want to address its problems.”

In his resignation letter, Brown wrote that he finds it “increasingly difficult to defend issues and statements made by Party leaders and officials” at the national, state, and local levels. Speaking to Obradovich by phone, Brown cited Representative Steve King’s recent comments about undocumented immigrants, guns, and what he characterized as “war on science and common sense” with respect to climate change.

UPDATE: The Sunday Des Moines Register published a guest column by Brown on August 25. Excerpts are after the jump. He plans to switch his party registration to Democrat.

Excerpts from Chad Brown’s column in the Sunday Des Moines Register on August 25, About my switch–The Republican Party has left me:

I felt so increasingly uncomfortable by the inter-party dysfunction, and extreme vision, that I lost faith in the party. Personally, I believe the Republican Party no longer represents Iowa’s values. I plan to move forward to officially switch my party affiliation to Democrat.

Republicans misread the electorate in 2012 and have since doubled down, particularly in their rhetoric and unwillingness to work for solutions on problems facing our country. This objection has pushed me to realize that I needed to make a change as a matter of personal necessity.

Recently, the GOP has clung to views that are out of touch and are too extreme for Iowans. Their resistance to reach out and work with those across the aisle is on full display every day from local, state and national Republicans. […]

In the past few years, the Republican Party has been the party of subtraction. When I was younger, I was drawn to the GOP because they espoused “The Big Tent.” I stood behind the ideals of past Republican presidents because they represented freedom and justice for all.

Now, among many segments of the Republican Party, “The Big Tent” has become a negative idea that somehow compromises their most sacred principles.

I am a husband with a daughter in kindergarten and another baby on the way. As a parent, I see my children’s education, and all children’s education, as essential to the future. I want my children to have the chance to receive the best education they can – starting from the first day of preschool straight through college.