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A gay GOP group is seeking official recognition by the California Republican Party at its biannual gathering in Sacramento this weekend, potentially setting the stage for a divisive floor fight on Sunday.

Charles Moran, chairman of the group, the California chapter of the Log Cabin Republicans, cited work his members did in several competitive election contests in 2014 to argue that the group deserves a party charter.

They know were worker bees and go out there, walking precincts, making phone calls, he said, noting that his members volunteered for several candidates, including newly elected state Assemblywoman Catherine Baker in the Bay Area and state Sen. Janet Nguyen in Orange County.

Weve earned our street cred. Now its the point where were seeking that official recognition from the party. Weve earned it," Moran said.

Conservatives are lining up to oppose the effort, arguing that it would weaken the Republican Partys values.

Karen England, executive director of the Capitol Resource Institute, a Sacramento-based group that backs conservative social causes, told supporters in an email Saturday morning that the Log Cabin group should not be recognized because it focuses on lifestyle preferences rather than growing the GOP.

If Log Cabin California is chartered, look for the California Republican Party platform to bewatered down in terms of family values, England wrote.

The partys official platform says homosexuality is unacceptable.

We believe public policy and education should not be exploited to present or teach homosexuality as an acceptable alternative lifestyle. We oppose same-sex partner benefits, child custody, and adoption, the platform says.

However, the move comes amid a changing landscape for gay people and the party. Last year, GOP gubernatorial candidate Neel Kashkari marched in a gay pride parade, the first statewide Republican candidate to do so. Assemblyman Rocky Chavez (R-Oceanside), who is considering a run for U.S. Senate, supports same-sex marriage. The Log Cabin Luau, hosted by the California group, where attendees don rainbow-colored leis and sip mai tais, is among the best attended parties at state GOP conventions.

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Gay group seeks official recognition from California Republican Party

As President Obama fights in Congress and the courts to preserve the nation's sweeping healthcare law, the Affordable Care Act faces still another threat to its viability: Republicans in statehouses, many bucking governors of their own party eager to accept its flow of federal dollars.

When a group of Republican governors filed suit to overturn Obama's signature achievement, Wyoming's Matt Mead was among them, arguing the legislation was a vast overreach that violated the Constitution and trampled the right of states to set their own policies.

But after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected that argument, Mead decided it would be foolhardy to pass up tens of millions of dollars the act provided to expand coverage for Wyoming's uninsured adults.

"We have fought the fight," Mead told lawmakers last month in his State of the State address. "We've done our best to find a fit for Wyoming. We are out of timeouts, and we need to address Medicaid expansion."

That argument failed to sway lawmakers in Wyoming's GOP-run Senate, which voted 19 to 11 to reject Mead's proposal; many of the opponents, said Phil Nicholas, the Senate president, had campaigned on a promise to block Medicaid expansion.

A similar dynamic is playing out in legislatures across the country, including Arizona, Florida and Utah, where conservative lawmakers remain a formidable hurdle to momentum building behind the Democratic goal of guaranteeing universal coverage.

Indeed, they have proved far more effective at thwarting the 2010 healthcare law than their Republican counterparts in Washington, who have voted more than 50 times to repeal all or part of the program many call Obamacare, largely to no avail.

Earlier this month, in Tennessee's GOP-led Senate, a committee rejected a proposal to extend Medicaid coverage despite a strong push by the state's Republican governor, Bill Haslam, and waivers from the Obama administration meant to allay conservative concerns.

"I said from the very beginning it would be difficult," Haslam told reporters after his plan was shot down. "I think what you saw today is a measure of just how difficult."

The role of state lawmakers could become even more important depending how the Supreme Court rules this spring in another challenge to the healthcare law. Opponents are seeking to end the public subsidy for residents in as many as 37 states where the federal government operates the marketplace for health insurance.

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Republican lawmakers hold the line against Obamacare at state level

After six weeks in session and 139 roll call votes in a House and Senate that feature some of the largest Republican majorities in generations, one of the most telling statistics from the new Congress is this: President Obama's veto threats outnumber the bills Congress has been able to send him.

When Republicans swept into power last November, they promised a new era of productivity and discipline that would break four years of gridlock. "America's New Congress," they called it.

But far from striking a bold contrast with the last two terms of stalemate, congressional Republicans have quickly run into familiar obstacles, including partisan paralysis and party infighting.

Friday, as members of Congress rushed to leave town on a bitterly cold morning, Republicans celebrated their most visible accomplishment to date: sending the Keystone XL pipeline bill to Obama's desk for his expected veto.

"To the president I would say this: Do the right thing, sign this bill and help us create more jobs," House Speaker John A. Boehner of Ohio said in brief remarks before affixing his signature to the legislation.

But as members of Congress go home for their first extended break since Republicans took control Jan. 6, they have few other achievements.

Only two bills have become law one a leftover from last year that funds a terrorism insurance program important to real estate developers, the other a noncontroversial measure to address mental health problems among veterans.

That compares with six new laws at this point in 2007, when Democrats came to power in both chambers for the final two years of President George W. Bush's tenure.

The new Republican majority, said one lawmaker granted anonymity to speak openly about their work, is like the dog that caught the car still figuring out what to do next. Rather than begin the year with an agreed-upon strategy or comprehensive agenda for the party in power, the 114th Congress opened last month with a loosely defined set of legislative priorities.

Even the Keystone bill was passed only after an exhaustive process in the Senate. During the course of the debate, more amendments were discussed and dispensed with than in the entire previous year when Democrats were in charge.

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Republican majorities struggle to get Congress working

Despite Texas reputation as a Republican bulwark and a stronghold for conservatism, the states electorate doesnt lean as hard to the right youd think. Not by a long shot.

Data from Gallup Daily tracking interviews in 2014 which interviewed more than 177,000 U.S. adults showed that Wyoming and Utah are the top two most Republican states again. Wyoming (Republican advantage: 35.5 percent) and Utah (33.1 percent) have topped the list every year since 2008.

The poll asked respondents to identify as Democratic or Republican Party members. Independents were asked in which direction they leaned. Nationwide, respondents identified as Democrats by a 3 percent margin. Massachusetts and Maryland were the most Democratic states, and the only two blue states with a party gap greater than 20 percent.

The 10 most Republican states all hold advantages over the Democratic Party by more than 10 percent. But Texas is not among these solid Republican states nor the leaning Republican states (states where the party gap is between 5 and 10 percent). Instead Texas is among the 18 competitive states, with Republicans holding a 3.9 percent advantage over Democrats.

That small percent still means a more than 1 million voter-advantage for Texas Republicans. Still, with the states changing demographics, analysts expect that gap to dwindle even further. However it could be at least a decade before Texas realistically has a shot of becoming a purple state.

See our slideshow for a look at the most Republican and most conservative states Texas numbers will surprise you.

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Texas is not among the most Republican states as demographics shift

California has stood as a bright-blue bulwark against conservative political surges for years now, blocking at its border a series of national Republican sweeps and giving President Obama historically huge victories.

So it was with no little optimism that Republicans here gathered Saturday under the slogan Bringing the conservative wave to California. Their faith was rewarded by a rarity multiple presidential hopefuls in California prospecting for actual votes, not money.

It was not exactly the first string, though former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and former Hewlett-Packard Chief Executive Carly Fiorina all delivered spirited denunciations of Obama, of liberals and occasionally of California, as they labored mightily to heighten their profiles.

They accused Obama of cowering in the face of international threats and gazing elsewhere as the nations middle class suffered in the backwash of the fiscal crisis he inherited. They castigated his former secretary of State and leading Democratic presidential contender Hillary Rodham Clinton as like-minded.

After a decade of discontent a period that included part of the last Republican presidents tenure the American people are looking for a new direction, Perry declared as he co-opted Obamas 2008 slogan: They want real hope, real change and real leadership.

Fiorina took aim at the dominance of Californias Democrats, blaming them for the states economic woes and the gap between its billionaires and the poverty-stricken.

California is the test case; it is the proof positive of what happens when liberals are in charge for too long, she said.

The daylong event at the historic Fox Performing Arts Center in Riverside drew more than 850 attendees, and was formed by two components: a drive by conservative groups to coalesce their strength, and the faint hope that with a huge and fluctuating Republican field, the 2016 race could be undecided as the campaign roars into the states late primary.

California could become the kingmaker on the Republican side in June of 2016, and the people here are going to remember who came and asked for their vote instead of treating the state like an ATM, said John Berry, statewide co-coordinator for the Tea Party Patriots group.

Although Berry acknowledged that the chance of California going Republican in a general election is a long shot, he said conservative groups were working to influence elections large and small. The Unite Inland Empire coalition that sponsored the conservative gathering represented two dozen groups that previously operated separately.

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A rare sighting: Republican presidential prospects come to California