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From left: Democrats Keith Ellison, Jamie Harrison, Tom Perez and Pete Buttigieg are competing to become the next chair of the Democratic National Committee. Donna Brazile has been acting in the role since Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz resigned after a hack of the organization showed it was not providing equal support to candidates in the presidential primary. Lauren Victoria Burke, J. Scott Applewhite, Molly Riley, Joe Raymond/AP hide caption

From left: Democrats Keith Ellison, Jamie Harrison, Tom Perez and Pete Buttigieg are competing to become the next chair of the Democratic National Committee. Donna Brazile has been acting in the role since Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz resigned after a hack of the organization showed it was not providing equal support to candidates in the presidential primary.

Against a backdrop of turmoil and after big losses in November, the Democratic National Committee votes this week for its next leader. The winner of the DNC chair race will likely reflect whether the committee's voting members think it prudent to align their party with the Hillary Clinton-Barack Obama camp, the Bernie Sanders camp or neither.

With the fast-moving developments of the Trump administration, Democrats have struggled to focus their efforts. But the coalescence of a grassroots resistance, seen in protests across the country, has generated new confidence and energy in those running.

The new chair will replace Donna Brazile, who took the job on an interim basis after Debbie Wasserman Schultz resigned the leadership in July, when WikiLeaks released emails that appeared to show DNC officials discussing how to hurt Sanders in the primaries.

To get on the ballot, a candidate needs the signatures of 20 out of 447 voting members. The ballot goes out on Tuesday, then members will vote during the party's meeting in Atlanta on Saturday, in as many rounds as it takes for a candidate to garner 224 votes.

Former Labor Secretary Tom Perez is trying to solidify front-runner status: Last week he contacted DNC members saying that he had locked in support from 180 voters. Rep. Keith Ellison, expected to be the main challenger to Perez, replied with a letter to members that said it was inappropriate for a candidate to try to "make the race sound like it is over," adding, "We are very confident in our whip count and are in an excellent position to win."

Here is a look at candidates Perez, Ellison, Jaime Harrison, Pete Buttigieg and Sally Boynton Brown. Highlights from interviews with NPR and others indicate where they want to take the party:

Perez, 55, represents the Obama camphe was secretary of Labor from 2013 until last month, and was considered the most liberal member of President Obama's Cabinet. Before joining the Labor Department, he was head of the U.S. Justice Department's Civil Rights Division.

What went wrong in 2016

"What voters heard was 'he's feeling my pain, he's feeling my anxiety. And what they heard all too frequently from the Clinton campaign was, 'Vote for me because he's crazy.' I will stipulate to the accuracy of that statement, but that's not an affirmative message," Perez told the Washington Post.

How the DNC can be more useful

"We have to up our game," Perez told NPR in January. "And the reason I'm running is because we have to make sure that we are providing help and partnership with the state parties. Organizing has to be a 12-month endeavor. You can't show up at a church every fourth October and say, 'vote for me,' and call that persuasion. ...

"What I want to do if I have the good fortune of being elected chair is build a party infrastructure in partnership with our state partners so that we have organizers in place in urban, suburban, and rural communities across America so that we are a force on important issues, whether it's voting rights, whether it's cybersecurity. And we need to have a director of cybersecurity at the DNC, which we currently don't have."

On whether Democrats should pursue obstruction or cooperation

"We need to take the fight to Donald Trump. If they're talking about deporting children, we're going to take the fight to Donald Trump. If Donald Trump wants to raise the minimum wage to $15, yes, I will work with Donald Trump. But you know what? If they are going to try to have a deportation task force and they're going to try to continue to deny climate change, you're damn right we need to fight. And we will continue that fight because this is a battle for the heart and soul of who we are as Americans," he told NPR.

Key endorsements: former Vice President Joe Biden, former Attorney General Eric Holder, former Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and former Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius

Ellison, 53, represents Minnesota's 5th District, which includes Minneapolis and some of its suburbs. In 2007, he became the first Muslim elected to U.S. Congress.

What went wrong in 2016

"The thing is that before 2008, we had the 50-state strategy, and that is in fact still pretty popular among DNC members," told Vox in January. "As you notice, we did pretty well in 2006; we did pretty well in 2008. I think that's because we still had enough connectivity in place from that 50-state strategy, but as time wore on, the tremendous popularity of Barack Obama, his amazing rhetorical skills, his just unparalleled ability to explain things and to inspire people really is the fuel that we lived on. Because of that, we lost a lot."

What Democrats need to learn from Republicans

"I do not believe that Democrats have identified the fact that voter expansion has to be a strategic goal of ours, and yet Republicans clearly are aware that voter suppression must be a strategic goal of theirs," he told Vox. "They're actively suppressing the vote. They're doing it in 50 states. They're doing it with a PR program. They're doing it with a state legislative program. They're doing it with a city program, just simply not enough voting machines. They're doing it with a legal program. What are we doing? We're doing state by state. Oregon's doing great work, but what about others? This should be 50 pieces of legislation introduced in all states that expand the vote. That's clearly what we need to be doing. The DNC has to help do that."

How the Democrats can win

"Voter turnout has got to be something that is on the mind of every rank-and-file Democrat, every Democratic officeholder. We must, in terms of turnout, think in terms of expanding the electorate beyond the people who are the likely voters in the swing states. Turnout has got to be key," Ellison told Vox.

"When I was elected in 2006, my district had the lowest turnout in the state of Minnesota. Now it's the highest, and it's consistently the highest. ... We don't have no statewide Republicans. We used to. You remember Tim Pawlenty, who used to be the governor, and you remember Norm Coleman. Why can't a Norm Coleman or a Tim Pawlenty get back into statewide office? Because in the Fifth Congressional District, we spike the vote so high they cannot get in."

Key endorsements: Sen. Bernie Sanders; Sen. Elizabeth Warren; Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer; New Hampshire Democratic Party Chairman Raymond Buckley, who dropped out of the DNC race over the weekend

Harrison, 40, is chair of the South Carolina Democratic Party. He was previously executive director of the House Democratic Caucus and worked for the lobbying firm the Podesta Group.

On what went wrong

"We got spoiled because we had the political phenom of Barack Obama. And we won in '08, and we won in '12, but we lost sight of it's not just about 1600 Pennsylvania. It's about also those folks who are working and representing people on Main Street," Harrison told NPR.

Where party goes from here

"The people who are elected on local levels have just as much impact, if not more, on the day-to-day lives of citizens," he told NPR. "And so we can't just be focused on the White House. If we do what we have to do on a state level, then the White House is gravy. And that's the focus. ... And let me tell you this look at the victories in 2006 and in 2008. Howard Dean started the 50-state strategy in 2006. I don't know if folks remember. The 2004 election was probably just as sobering of election for Democrats. We lost everything. But what happened is Howard Dean came, enacted this 50-state strategy, and we won the House and the Senate back in '06. And then based on that foundation, we grew the majorities in the House and the Senate and added the president."

Why he should win

"If I become DNC chair at the age of 40, I'll probably half the average age of Democratic leadership in Washington, D.C. ... I bring a different perspective," he told NPR. "I will probably be the if elected chair probably the only person that's ever been on food stamps that's been chairman of the Democrat Party, the only chair that will have over $160,000 of student loan debt. I mean, I can relate to the story of so many in this country who started behind the start line and now are trying to become successful."

Key endorsements: Reps. James Clyburn, Tim Ryan, Marcia Fudge, and John Larson

Buttigieg is the 35-year-old mayor of South Bend, Ind. He's an officer in the U.S. Navy Reserve and left office temporarily in 2014 to serve in Afghanistan.

Where the party needs to go

"One thing that I've noticed about the other side of the aisle is they are very patient in building their majorities. You know, you had organizations that started by running people for school board in the '80s and are seeing dividends on that now. And we've got to have the same patience," he told NPR. "We, as a party, can't treat the next cycle like it's the only one that matters. For example, you know, 2020 is a year that will have huge implications for redistricting. And so we've got to be looking at the statehouses, not treating the presidency like it's the only office that matters."

Why it's crucial to have a message that's more than anger

"There have been a lot of outrages coming from Washington in the last few weeks, and they rightly inspire a level of anger, but we can't have that be the only thing anybody hears from us. We've got to be talking about what our values actually are and what the policies are that flow from them," he told NPR. "When we're talking about things like the deportation rates, we should also be talking about the importance of family, why we believe it's important to keep families intact and allow families to stay together. Every time we're saying no to something, we've got to be saying yes to something else. And I do think that we can have an energy that is at or above the level of what you saw with the tea party."

On whether town hall protests are a good strategy

"I think the important thing right now is to really lift up our voices and speak to the values that make us Democrats. You know, one of the things that's striking about the town halls is a lot of them are very specifically about issues like whether people are going to have their health care taken away," he told NPR. "And the more we can have this discussion focus on how ordinary people are going to be affected by the decisions that are being made in Washington, then the better chance we have of reconnecting with a lot of parts of the country that didn't really feel like they were in touch with the Democratic Party in the last go around. ... Compromise is only possible when the other party is working in good faith. And if there's one thing that Democrats in Congress in Washington learned the hard way about congressional Republicans it's that there's not a lot of people there in good faith."

Why he should win

"We're all saying that we've got to engage a new generation. We've all said that we need to get back to the state and local level. And so my contention is if we're saying we want engage a new generation, bring in a leader from a new generation. If we're saying we want to compete and win in red and purple states, find somebody who's been competing and winning in as red a state as it gets, Mike Pence's Indiana," he told NPR. "And if we're recognizing that the solutions are not going to come from Washington, D.C., put in somebody who doesn't get up in the morning and go to an office in Washington, D.C., every day."

Key endorsements: former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley, former DNC chair and Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, former Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland

Boynton Brown, in her early 40s, has been the executive director of the Idaho Democratic Party since 2012.

On what went wrong

"Well, I really think that we have lost focus as a party. I don't think we have any overarching identity message. We've let the Republicans frame the debate and frame our party for a really long time. And, frankly, I will say that in losing the amount of statehouses that we've lost, we've also allowed them to legislate. And what we know is that they've been passing really dangerous voter suppression laws, really stripping Americans of their rights and their freedoms," she told NPR in January.

"And we have not had an organization who's designed to fight back. We have 57 state parties who have been doing that to the best of their abilities. But it's time that we had a DNC really designed to look at not just the president of the United States and that seat but every single seat all the way down to school board and city council and county commissioner seats."

On what's next

"Ultimately, I think the Democratic Party's job is to save democracy and to be the fighters for freedom," she told NPR. "Republicans have been stripping us of our freedoms. There's a lot of evidence to suggest that our constitutional rights can be under fire in this next administration. And we absolutely must be of powerful voice to push back on anything that potentially is going to come down the road."

Key endorsements: California DNC member Christine Pelosi

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Who's Who In The Race For DNC Chair And Their Plans For Democrats To Win Again - NPR

New York Times

Move Left, Democrats New York Times The Democratic National Committee will choose its next leader on Saturday, and when it does it should choose a leader who will resist the pressure to pursue the wrong white people. Hundreds of articles have been written about the imperative of ... What are Democrats' chances for a House majority in 2018?Washington Examiner What's Going On In The First House Elections Of The Trump EraFiveThirtyEight all 6 news articles »

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Move Left, Democrats - New York Times

Former Democratic Party chairman Howard Dean spoke by video link to a forum on the party last year in Denver.

WHY HAVE DEMOCRATS struggled to defeat President Trumps most objectionable cabinet nominees? Because Hillary Clintons 3 million popular vote margin obscures this nettlesome fact: Outside California, Massachusetts, and New York, Donald Trump won by 4 million votes.

Across the map, political polarization and demographic sorting are shrinking the party. Since 2006, the Democrats have lost 10 percent of their seats in the Senate, 19 percent in the House, 20 percent in state legislatures, and 36 percent of governorships. In 2018 the Democrats must defend 9 seats in states Trump won. And in states controlled by Republicans, the GOP is legislating to weaken unions that support Democratic candidates.

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In much of America, a parody of Democrats prevails: Champions of big government. Practitioners of identity politics. Enablers of welfare cheats. Enemies of traditional values. Hand-wringers with no respect for our past or faith in our future.

However fraudulent, Trumps promise to make America great again addressed the displacement many Americans feel. True, this came with racial animus. But their longing and fears are real. Trump gave them a vision; the Democrats never found one.

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Our conservative columnist offers a weekly take on everything from politics to pet peeves.

These voters made him our president. Yet only Clinton addressed their anxieties with realistic proposals. This disconnect captures the Democrats quandary.

Two Americas perceive different realities the Democrats coastal, urban, better-educated, and more diverse enclaves; the GOPs whiter, less-privileged, and more traditionalist landmass. Critical is a distrust of elites and Washington, D.C. as proponents of activist government, Democrats suffer from both.

The result is programitis an afflication suffered by Democrats who describe their agenda in discrete pieces, eschewing a larger vision. But a party without a narrative has overlearned its lesson.

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Transcending demographics, race, and culture is imperative. Here the overlap between Trump and Bernie Sanders instructs. However different, both men promised to help those displaced by economic change. Among these voters, government was not a poison pill. But in November, Barbara Boxer told me, [They] didnt hear us speaking to them.

To be heard, Democrats must invoke government to serve American exceptionalism: helping unleash the potential of every person wherever or whoever they are to lift themselves and their country. Only then do their means cohere in a vision.

In this narrative, government exists not to reorganize a free society, but to strengthen it. The ends are moral and pragmatic. Which child could become the next Bill Gates or Jonas Salk, or that teacher, mentor, businessperson, or parent who helps our community thrive not just the one we see, but the country we share? Every wasted life diminishes our economic and human capital, to everyones loss.

Democrats can repeal the forces of automation and globalization that beset struggling families no more than Trump can. But a responsive Democratic party can provide education and retraining for the new economy; strengthen public schools; diminish student debt; and make college free for those in need.

Universal health care prevents illness from ruining lives and draining our collective wealth. Rebuilding infrastructure roads, airports, internet access, energy grids creates jobs and strengthens our economy. Tax breaks? Former Democratic National Committe chairman Howard Dean suggests they go to businesses that invest in regions left behind.

This vision of national renewal cuts across age, ethnicity and class. Further, Dean believes, Trump is repelling young people who embrace inclusiveness, reproductive choice, and combating climate change. Last years election showed them that disengagement breeds disaster; now the party must become their vehicle.

Candor might help. The young know we are saddling them with debt; few think entitlements can survive. Yet Democrats have ignored massive deficits while using Social Security to frighten Mom and Pop.

Ducking hard facts may serve their short-term interests. But disingenuousness invites distrust among the young. Only responsible tax and budgetary policies, and measures to save entitlements from crisis or privatization, will address their and our reality.

Where should Democrats take this vision? Everywhere.

As DNC chair, in 2006, Dean recruited candidates and rebuilt the party nationwide. His 50 state strategy invested in races for Congress, state legislatures, and local office, ignoring critics who accused him of squandering resources.

The result? Democrats captured the House, the Senate, and a majority of governorships and state legislatures. Crucial, Dean relates, was refusing to cede territory or ignore loyal constituencies gaining seats in places like Kansas proved critical to success.

This means avoiding ideological litmus tests Montana is not Massachusetts. But Deans model gave Barack Obama the Democratic Congress that helped create his legacy. Triumphant, the party narrowed its focus to reelecting Obama. Now his legacy is at risk.

The party of national renewal must be a national party.

Continued here:
Renewing the Democrats and America - The Boston Globe

In a recent article,Washington Post reporter David Weigel argues that the critical stance of Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) towardPresident Trump is harmful to Democrats. Weigel says:

Trump feeds off mainstream Republican opposition. we should not stop remembering how he changed party politics. Trump smashed the mainstream consensus of political science that nominees need party elite support to succeed. Instead,he ran as a figure outside the normal party system, pulling in voters who did not consider themselves Republicans.

Weigel is certainly right that Trump won the nomination without GOP elite support while using anti-establishment rhetoric and taking some unorthodox stands. But there is little evidence that he won by mobilizing voters who did not consider themselves Republicans.

[The prospects of a quick Obamacare repeal are sinking fast]

There have been campaigns in both parties in which an outsider or underdog candidate won disproportionate support from independent voters in the primaries in a battle against an establishment favorite: Barack Obama and Bernie Sanders vs. Hillary Clinton, John McCain vs. George W. Bush, Bill Bradley vs. Al Gore, Gary Hart vs. Walter Mondale. All of the outsiders/underdogs lost except Obama, who did have significant elite support, albeit less, initially, than Clinton.

Trumps story is quite different. He won not chiefly by attracting new non-Republican voters but by appealing to existing GOP voters who received no clear signal as to who the best alternative was. Perhaps Trump would have won even if the Republican elite had coalesced around an alternative, but that was not what happened.

First, Trump did not win by luring independents into the primaries. The first chart below shows the proportions of the primary or caucus vote cast for Republicans in the 17 states that had exit polls in 2012 and 2016. (Source: exit polls archived on CNNs Election Central.) Although turnout grew from 2012 to 2016, the independent share of the GOP primary vote did not greatly increase. In a majority of states, it was lower in 2016 than in 2012. This should not be surprising, because in 2016 there was a Democratic nomination contest to attract some independents, while in 2012 all of the action was on the Republican side.

[Republicans used to fear Russians. Heres what they think now.]

More important, as the second chart based on the 26states with exit polls in 2016 shows, Trump won broadly similar levels of support from Republican andindependent voters in GOP primaries.

In fact, in a majority of states in which exit polls were conducted, Trump won more support from Republican identifiers than independents. The GOP candidate who won disproportionate support from independents in 2016 was Ohio Gov. John Kasich, not Trump. (Many states lacking exit polls held caucuses in which Trump fared poorly.)

[Senate Democrats are battling every Trump nomination. Heres how that can hobble Trumps policy agenda.]

Trump was not a party regular and didnt run as one.Yet his message appealed to many traditional Republicans.

In the general election, he won a very narrow victory based on consolidating support from 90percentof Republican voters, many of whom had not supported him in the primaries and had misgivings about him. That being the case, the claim that it is bad news for Democrats or those worried about Trumps actions if McCain (or other prominent Republicans) are visible critics of the president is not supported.

David Karol is an associate professor of government and politics at the University of Maryland at College Park.

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No, Republican opposition to Trump won't hurt Democrats - Washington Post

Having had their electoral lunch unexpectedly eaten in November, Democrats across the nation are in more disarray than Bob Dylans hair, with factions riding off in different directions. There are all manner of sub-sets and niche gripes, as you would expect in an outfit as big as the Democrat Party. But the main demarcation organizes around a split between the full-goose bozo Sandersista ideologues and the lets-just-win-and-keep-power branch that occasionally makes limited concessions to reality. A recent example of this in Florida is the noises made by some ambitious Democrats, with the backing of some party activists, that they will offer primary opposition to incumbent Democrat U.S. Senator Bill Nelson in 2018.

This one takes a little probing to understand. After all, Bill Nelson is the only Democrat to hold a statewide office in Florida. Purple Florida is a toss-up state. But the governor, the entire state cabinet, and the other U.S. Senator are all Republicans. The bland and inoffensive Nelson has maneuvered this environment well. He has held elected office in Florida since 1978, when he won a seat in the U.S. House from the Orlando area. After 12 years in the House and a half dozen as Floridas Insurance Commissioner, Nelson won an open seat in the U.S. Senate in 2000 when Connie Mack retired. Nelson won reelection to the seat with 60 percent of the vote in 2006 and in 2012 with 55 percent of the vote, though in neither cycle against a really first-rate Republican.

Nelson is often described in the press, and by voters who follow these things, as a moderate. But this label is more on the basis of style than voting record. Nelson is mild-mannered, not a flamethrower or ideological loudmouth. He has a good-ole-boy drawl and he doesnt wear Che Guevara sweatshirts on the Senate Floor. But a quick check with those ideological rating agencies that score voting records shows that in most of his many years in the Senate, Nelson has had a more liberal voting record that the average Democrat Senator. For example, in the National Journals ranking of Senate votes in 2013, Nelson has a more liberal voting record than either Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders. The American Conservative Union gives Nelsons voting record a lifetime conservative score of 28.4, while Republican Florida Senator Marco Rubios lifetime conservative score is 97.2. Some moderate. Drawl or no, Nelson has been a reliable vote for the left for a long time.

Loyal leftist or no, Nelson has gotten a lot of votes from moderate Republicans and independents. And these folks will make up a bigger fraction of the election in off-year 2018 than they would in a presidential year. So what gives? The Democrats have 23 Senate seats to defend in 2018 (not to mention those of the independent Bernie Sanders and Maines junior senator Angus King), the Republicans only 10. So why give the push to a proven winner with statewide name recognition who has always been a reliable vote for the Democrats agenda?

In order to answer this I pestered some party activists and consultants, who talked on condition that I not use their names. What I learned was there is indeed a feeling among some Florida Democrats that Nelson would be vulnerable in 2018 against his likely opponent (likely for now), current Florida Governor Rick Scott, whose final term expires in 2018. Nelson, one summed it up, just doesnt look fresh he doesnt appeal to young Democrats.

Sounds like judging a politician by standards more applicable to fruit or pastry. But perhaps it makes sense. Nelson will be 76 in 2018, and would be 80 when the 2018 Senate term expires. Hardly in the first bloom of youth. But Senators in their eighties are not uncommon. John McCain is 80, and appears as ornery and disputatious as he was when he was 60. When one sees Nelson on the tube or in person, he does not appear like a man who will soon be ordering a walker and an ear-trumpet. And while Scott is a decade younger than Nelson, the Fountain of Youth contingent might consider him also somewhat less than daisy fresh, as much of a Mustache Pete as Nelson.

Recent political history favors outsiders, so there is time for someone in this category to pop up and take the Republican senatorial nomination. But if the Rs put up Scott, the Democrats may well be overestimating Scotts political power. Scotts record as governor holds appeal for conservatives, but hes a weak campaigner, tentative and inarticulate on the stump. And his electoral record is less than impressive. Scott was a successful businessman and political rookie when he narrowly beat Florida Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink for the governors office in 2010. In 2014 Scott won re-election to the governors job by beating Charlie Crist (yes, that Charlie Crist) by one point. Scott currently doesnt poll as well as Nelson does. Were not talking a political powerhouse here.

Democrats are impressed by how much campaign cash Scott would be able to raise for the 2018 race. But they may be overestimating the importance of this. If youre not the political flavor of the month, even if you have a solid record as a former Florida governor, money may avail you little. I call the jurys attention to Jeb! Bushs operatically unsuccessful presidential campaign in 2016, when he collected and spent an amount equal to roughly half the national debt and got nothing for it.

A more important factor may be how popular Donald Trump is in the fall of 2018. A popular Trump would raise the proposed of all Rs, and Scott was one of Trumps early supporters.

The ambitious Democrats saying they might take on Nelson include Nova Southeastern University law professor Tim Canova, who, with Bernie Sanders endorsement, ran against South Florida Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz in the 2016 primary and lost. Former U.S. Senate candidate Pam Keith and Orlando State Senator Randolph Bracy also say they have been urged to run by others and are considering.

Democrat would-be challengers natter on about the next generation of leadership. Florida Republicans find comfort in the prospect that if a proven Democrat walks the plank in favor of a challenger who is barely known outside of his (her) zip code, or even gets beat up in a primary battle, the next generation of leadership in the U.S. Senate will likely be Republican times two.

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Loyal Democrat Bill Nelson to be given the push in Florida? - American Spectator