The speculation over Republican National Committee (RNC) Chairman Michael Steele’s future with the group will come to an end tonight. At 7:30 p.m. EST, he is scheduled to speak with members of the RNC during a conference call. Fox News’ sources indicate that Steele will announce that he will not seek a second term during the call, but the chairman has remained coy about his decision. The next RNC chair will be selected when the organization’s members meet in the middle of January.

Steele’s two years as chairman of the party been filled with both positives and negatives for his image. In terms of results, Steele has overseen two of the most successful years for the GOP; when he took the helm in early 2009 the party was in a state of crisis after Barack Obama swept Democrats to wide majorities in both chambers of Congress, but the GOP regrouped in 2010 and won historic margins in Congress for the midterm elections.

At the same time, Steele himself has been plagued by a continual series of gaffes that distracted from his other work, and the party closes 2010 with its future weighed by over $15 million in debt. Though the RNC chairman is not selected by any form of popular vote, rank and file Republicans have turned against Steele. Almost half of Republican voters would oppose Steele if he ran for the chairmanship again according to a recent poll.

A host of other candidates are already in the race no matter what Steele announces Monday night. Wisconsin Republican Party chairman Reince Priebus is projected as an early front runner. He has already wrapped up the support of Wisconsin’s GOP and is backed by influential Mississippi Gov. and former RNC Chairman Haley Barbour. Also among those running: former Michigan Republican chairman Saul Anuzis, Gentry Collins who was the RNC’s political director until he resigned last month with a scathing letter against Steele, and former RNC co-chair Ann Wagner.

Those currently running have fairly low public profiles, much like Steele before he won the chairmanship in 2009. That could come back to haunt the party, though, as these individuals’ past ties will be subjected to greater public inspection if they win the chairmanship. Anuzis, for example, has defended Young Americans for Freedom, an organization the Southern Poverty Law Center termed a hate group over its white nationalist statements.

If suspicions that Steele will not run again are confirmed, other possible candidates may be willing to enter the race. Former Minnesota Sen. Norm Coleman has been speculated about as a possible candidate earlier this year. He recently stated that he would not oppose Steele but did not deny his interest in running if the current chairman steps aside. Coleman — who helped found the conservative nonprofit American Action Network after he lost his Senate election in 2008 — would likely have the highest name recognition of any candidate if he chooses to run.

Mike Duncan, Steele’s predecessor as RNC Chair and current chairman of American Crossroads, is weighing whether to run for his old position. American Crossroads was the biggest outside player in the 2010 midterm elections, becoming a symbol for undisclosed spending after Citizens United. Duncan would be a major player if he puts his hat into the ring. The RNC chair is primarily responsible for party fundraising, so Duncan’s success leading American Crossroads would augur well for his ability to lead the RNC out of its debt problem as they seek to reclaim the White House in 2012.

Mike Duncan, chairman of American Crossroads, told The Washington Times that his group and American Crossroads Grassroots Policy Strategies plan to plow more than $49 million of it into 11 Senate races in anticipation that the Republican Party is within reach of a Senate majority.

And, in an inversion of the usual image of “coattails” descending from the top of the ticket to a party’s candidates for lower offices, he says a number of Senate seats are in play because of the strength of strong House candidates in the respective states.

“People thought it wasn’t possible, but Republicans now have a good chance of winning control of the Senate – in part because we have a good chance of taking the House,” he said.

The groups are basing their optimism about taking back the Senate partly on a poll conducted by the Republican firm Public Opinion Strategies, which tested 1,300 likely voters across 13 states, rendering a state-by-state sample size that’s so small, it makes the results effectively meaningless.

Nonetheless, Duncan argues the poll shows Republican candidates leading by an average of 8 points in Republican-held Florida, Kentucky, Missouri, New Hampshire and Ohio, and ahead by 7 points in Democrat-held Arkansas, Colorado, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Washington. Of those thirteen Senate battleground states, American Crossroads pledges to spend money in eleven of them — candidates in Delaware and Indiana look like they’re on their own.

The new American Crossroads organization will be run by former RNC Chairman Mike Duncan and Joanne Davidson, a onetime RNC co-chair. Former RNC Chairman Ed Gillespie and former White House adviser Karl Rove are informally advising the organization.

Not entirely different from what happened in 2005 and 2006, when critics of Howard Dean within the Democratic Party formed their own efforts.

The decision to kill the Center leaves the RNC with “no policy office,” at least for the foreseeable future, according to the GOP official with direct knowledge of the decision. I tried to ask the RNC to respond to this claim, but RNC spokesperson Jon Thompson refused to answer repeated request for comment.

The Center’s original purpose was founded on the premise that the GOP had grown bereft of real ideas, was failing to “provide solutions to the kitchen table concerns” of Americans, and had grown addicted to “falling back on ideology alone,” according to an RNC memo last December announcing the Center’s creation.

Honestly, this seems like something the RNC can get away with killing. Its invention by a chairman trying to save its job was always suspicious, and after he won the chairmanship Michael Steele (who’d been attacked for his occasional cozying-up to moderates) said he didn’t want to get into ideological disputes, as these would be sorted out by elected Republicans. That’s the right policy. But coming in the midst of an all-out GOP effort to block bills because “government has never created a job,” well …

The worry here is that this sets up a race between Michael Steele and Katon Dawson. Jeff Frederick, the chair of the Virginia GOP, murmured that most of Duncan’s support will go to Dawson. Depending on they break that could put Dawson ahead for the fourth round.

From a second nominating speech: “He knows this committee better than anyone I’ve ever worked with. Mike Duncan’s only agenda is serving his committee, serving his candidates.”

Katon Dawson, the South Carolina Republican chairman who’s been battered by stories about his membership in a whites-only country club, is next. Glen McCall, a black committee member from the state, gets up for a character witness speech. “Katon’s been a mentor to me,” McCall says. “We’re not like the Democrats. We’re about experience and accomplishments.”

In key areas of vending and contracting at the RNC, many documents were signed before Mike Duncan could get a team in place. It may not be well known, but it is a fact that Duncan, by and large, had to live with decisions made before he got there. In fact, there is only one area where Duncan could fully stretch his legs as Chairman of the Party unhindered by either a de facto party head in the White House and a Presidential campaign calling the shots — fundraising. In that area, Duncan thrived.

This has the ring of truth. We forget this, but circa May and June Duncan was viewed as a low-key whiz kid, a mega-fundraiser who had solved the Florida and Michigan primary crises (which roiled the Democrats for months) with a Solomoniac solution: Give each rogue state half of its delegates.

I’ve heard a number of DC Republicans and McCain campaign vets credit Duncan’s fundraising for keeping them in the game with President-elect Barack Obama. They stress, though, that the RNC chairman isn’t ever going to become the face of the opposition.

Still it’s interesting to see this (which follows from this) at RedState. It’s becoming the grassroots conservative site that makes no real demands from the Republicans, as long as they win.

For the last eight years, President Bush has led our country with firm determination and a steady hand in the face of numerous challenges and crises. He restored honor and integrity to the White House and protected America from another terrorist attack.

As President and Mrs. Bush prepare to leave Washington in a few weeks to return to Texas, I know I speak for Republicans and grassroots leaders across America when I say we are all grateful for their tremendous service to our country. To show our appreciation for our Commander-in-Chief, the RNC is asking every Republican to sign an electronic card that will be presented to President Bush before he leaves office. It is the least each of us can do to show our gratitude to the leader of our country and our Party.

“Gratitude” for what he’s done for Republicans? Maybe he should have sent this to the MoveOn.org list.

Here’s his press release in full:

“Minnesota law reads that an election contest – not Harry Reid – should decide the winner of a contested election. The efforts of Al Franken, Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer to steal this election and seat Al Franken despite not having an election certificate are unprecedented.

“When elections are being decided by double-counted votes and double standards in the treatment of absentee ballots, there must be a remedy to get an accurate and valid vote total – that remedy is an election contest. That is the law of Minnesota enacted by the people of Minnesota. The people of Minnesota deserve to see their laws followed.

“I am confident that if the law is followed, Norm Coleman will be taking his rightful seat in the U.S. Senate.”

Unfortunately for the RNC, no one outside of the GOP appears to agree.