On the governor’s race in Colorado (partial transcript):

“We have our nominee.We know it was a tough primary. We know what has happened since then. There’s been a lot of noise out there that can be a distraction, or it can not be a distraction. I’d prefer we not be distracted by that noise. Give our nominee a chance to go out and state our case to the people of Colorado […] The people will decide who they want. […] If we could pick apart everyone’s life you could find something you don’t like. There’s something that they’ve done to cause you to pause. But then you have to go to the next question. Does it stop the momentum towards winning? Or do we get past that and move forward and try to win the race? I’d prefer to move forward and try to win the race.”

On the bus tour:

“This bus tour is about organizing the party at its grassroots, firing them up, letting them know what’s at stake, the importance of this election and this campaign.”

On Tom Tancredo’s third party run and having a Republican governor:

“We’ve been through the wars together. And I understand he made a decision to go a different way, a different course. As national chairman I support the Republican party nominee and I encourage every Republican in Colorado to stand with that nominee. To make certain that that nominee has a chance to win. But again that boils down to individual decisions and choices, and I don’t get to make those, but what I can do is encourage our Republican base to stand with our nominee and to help our nominee get across the finish line. This is about having a Republican as governor of the state.”

Steele told Battle ‘10 (at 6:00 mark) that opening 343 “Victory” offices earlier in the year is “unprecedented” and makes Republicans competitive in all 50 states. He rejected insider views from Washington DC, and noted the path to victory in November would not be easy:

“Make sure to put a little more elbow grease into making sure that these candidates [win]. People in Washington don’t get to sit in judgment to say who is going to be the nominee and who gets to win or lose. […]“

When asked about resources allocation to perhaps 50 or 60 possibly competitive seats, Steele was adamant:

“We’ve allocated resources in a way we can be competitive. I said from the very beginning we would invest in races that most people, the professional class in Washington would look at, scratch their head and go, ‘Well why is he investing in that?’ [I’ll] give you a good example. Three days after we won in Virginia and New Jersey, we sent money up to Massachusetts, to invest in the race for Scott Brown. Scott Brown wasn’t even the nominee at the time. But we saw something on the ground happening in Massachusetts, in that little gap between November and January. We took the risk. The people in Washington: ‘Why are you spending money in Massachusetts? That’s Ted Kennedy’s seat.’ Well, the people thought otherwise. And we trusted their instincts and followed their leadership. And guess what, Scott Brown is now a Senator because the Republican National Committee invested in what the state party wanted to do, invested in what that candidate wanted to do, and they won.”

Steele told Battle ‘10 that while strategic resource allocation, like the money invested in Brown’s campaign in late 2009 that paid dividends earlier this year, will not be an absolute guarantee of victory, an unwillingness to take a chance and invest in candidates will definitely guarantee failure:

“So, do you win every time? No, trust me. I know you don’t win every race. But at some point this party has to start planting the seeds to win and stop courting defeat before they even attempt victory.