Martin had been the frontrunner from the beginning of the race, leveraging his relationships with the more than 400 voting members of the DNC that he forged over more than a decade of work inside the institutional Democratic Party.
real cool that 400 Democrats, all part of the existing party establishment, are the only people who get to vote in this.
Even in the age of social media, the Democratic Party remains a stubbornly closed-off enterprise. At the top, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) is a private corporation, as opposed to a membership organization like a labor union, and its leaders have impunity over how they set and enforce party rules. For decades, DNC insiders have gone to war to prevent basic transparency and grassroots reform efforts from gaining steam.
“There are a lot of good billionaires out there that have been with Democrats, who share our values, and we will take their money,” Ken Martin, a leading candidate for Chair of the Democratic Party, said at a forum on Sunday. “But we’re not taking money from those bad billionaires.”
and from his twitter account in October 2023, quote-tweeting Twin Cities DSA “Statement of Solidarity with Palestine”:
“From the river to the sea” is a chant used by extremists to support the destruction of Israel.
looks like we’re in for 4 more years of the same feckless bullshit from Democrats.
i mean no offense but if we’re worried about the “Democratic establishment” it should probably give people pause that the vast majority of Democratic establishment leadership supported Ben Wikler, while the majority of Ken Martin’s support was from the “grassroots” state party infrastructure:
This is a pretty big disappointment imo, and shows that the party didn’t really listen to its voters or learn from the election in any meaningful way. He was the least interesting and compelling candidate. I wish they had gone for someone with an actual ideology and values that they’ve lived and acted on for years—like Faiz Shakir. This role is very important, and it would have been a great way to show us that Dems actually care about us, and not just the money. But nope, they’ve taken yet another opportunity to give power to a bland vanilla fundraiser who almost nobody has heard of.
The race hinged more on the candidates’ organizing and fundraising resumes than on their postures regarding the ideological soul of the party, as it did in 2017, after President Donald Trump’s previous election win.
lol, Shakir? “Martin won a majority vote among DNC members on the first ballot, 246.5 to 134.5 for Ben Wikler, the chair of the Wisconsin Democratic Party. Martin O’Malley received 44 votes, Faiz Shakir received two and Jason Paul received one” you’re so out of touch, i don’t even know what to say.
Some of the at-large members have been on the national committee for many terms. Those include stalwarts of the party establishment like Donna Brazile, Harold Ickes, Minyon Moore, and Maria Cardona, triple-hitters who have led national campaigns or party conventions, show up frequently on cable TV as political commentators, and buckrake as lobbyists and/or well-paid public speakers. Brazile is a partner at “corporate reputation strategy firm” Purple Strategies, which has worked for BP, United Airlines, NASCAR, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and PhRMA. Ickes is a partner at Tiber Creek Group, whose clients include the Greater New York Hospital Association. Moore and Cardona are both partners at the Dewey Square Group, whose clients have included Lyft, McDonald’s, MGM Springfield, Sony Pictures, and the Ultimate Fighting Championship, and which has engaged in lobbying to undermine state labor protections.
this is the problem with Democrats in a nutshell - thinking “you’re out of touch with lobbyists and political consultants” is a dunk on someone.
Sounds about right, for someone who has an actual ideology and values that they’ve lived and acted on for years. Presumably, like Bernie, “no one wants to work with him.”
i love Faiz but it’s really as simple as “he cannot speak or animate a room to save his life and he’s clearly better working on infrastructure side of things than leading a political party”. there’s a reason he was Bernie’s senior advisor and not a public face of the campaign (and before that an aide to Nancy Pelosi).
Makes perfect sense to me. I have no idea about any of these people, my point was just that “can’t manage to get more than 2 votes in the DNC’s special secret election for special people only to determine the future, God help us, of our country” is, all other things being equal, a point in his favor.
If I had to guess, I would say that won’t happen. I do think that any actual activist organization will be labeled as terrorists and banned and the leaders imprisoned, and that the Democrats will be so thoroughly disenfranchised through a series of various antidemocratic moves that they cannot win again, until some sort of activism comes sufficiently to the front to actively challenge the GOP in ways the current Democrats are simply unable to do. That may happen before the next election, as resistance mounts in the face of increasingly horrifying things Trump tries to do, or it may take 20 years or more of misery and oppression.
I’m not planning on not supporting the Democrats in the meantime, and I would love to be wrong. I’m just saying that I predict they will be fine slotted into their place as performative opposition, as the real repression takes hold. Of course, particular high-profile “bad” Democrats like Biden, Harris, AOC, and so on, will probably be charged with crimes. Whether they will be found guilty and go to prison isn’t clear to me, although having them in some extrajudicial limbo that involves being sent to Gitmo once it’s expanded or something is also a possibility.
I am 0% joking about any of this, if it is not clear.
Initiating thought process…
… ok I see a headline that the DNC did something and I already want to set everything on fire but I am going to do my VERY BEST to reserve the kneejerk reaction and read folx comments and the story and who this dude is… Initial thoughts from the news story:
Minnesota, huh? Is this the DNC’s new strategy? When in trouble run for Minnesota politicians? The new improved “Southern Strategy,” if you will? Also, who the hell was the chair before? A Jaime Harrison from South Carolina. Huh, I know nothing about him but I guess the news says his tenure was filled with him arguing with the White House. Wtf does the DNC even do? Break their “code of neutrality” and back shitty primary candidates no one wants. Oh, and they fund raise, ignore constituent’s needs to build campaigns that suck, and do the whole outdated convention bs. Anyway, back to this Martin dude. If the White House was unwilling to listen to Harrison then why would anyone believe a game of musical chairs would fix any of this. The issue is corruption. The democrats are rotten from the inside. The party needs a full restructuring from ground up and at this point, we are very possibly to damned late.
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real cool that 400 Democrats, all part of the existing party establishment, are the only people who get to vote in this.
from May 2024: The Struggle for Democracy in the Democratic Party
from a recent Jacobin article:
and from his twitter account in October 2023, quote-tweeting Twin Cities DSA “Statement of Solidarity with Palestine”:
looks like we’re in for 4 more years of the same feckless bullshit from Democrats.
i mean no offense but if we’re worried about the “Democratic establishment” it should probably give people pause that the vast majority of Democratic establishment leadership supported Ben Wikler, while the majority of Ken Martin’s support was from the “grassroots” state party infrastructure:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_Democratic_National_Committee_chairmanship_election#Endorsements
(also, there is literally no ideological difference between most of these people. do you think Ben Wikler for example is pro-DSA? lol)
(oh, and that doesn’t even touch on Reid Hoffman and George Soros backing Wikler with a fucking PAC for an insider-baseball race like this)
This is a pretty big disappointment imo, and shows that the party didn’t really listen to its voters or learn from the election in any meaningful way. He was the least interesting and compelling candidate. I wish they had gone for someone with an actual ideology and values that they’ve lived and acted on for years—like Faiz Shakir. This role is very important, and it would have been a great way to show us that Dems actually care about us, and not just the money. But nope, they’ve taken yet another opportunity to give power to a bland vanilla fundraiser who almost nobody has heard of.
lol, Shakir? “Martin won a majority vote among DNC members on the first ballot, 246.5 to 134.5 for Ben Wikler, the chair of the Wisconsin Democratic Party. Martin O’Malley received 44 votes, Faiz Shakir received two and Jason Paul received one” you’re so out of touch, i don’t even know what to say.
be more specific - out of touch with whom, exactly?
out of touch with the ~400 voting members of the DNC?
can you name any of those 400, off the top of your head? I can’t, and I follow politics fairly closely.
the DNC itself doesn’t even publish the complete list - it had to be leaked
this is the problem with Democrats in a nutshell - thinking “you’re out of touch with lobbyists and political consultants” is a dunk on someone.
Sounds about right, for someone who has an actual ideology and values that they’ve lived and acted on for years. Presumably, like Bernie, “no one wants to work with him.”
i love Faiz but it’s really as simple as “he cannot speak or animate a room to save his life and he’s clearly better working on infrastructure side of things than leading a political party”. there’s a reason he was Bernie’s senior advisor and not a public face of the campaign (and before that an aide to Nancy Pelosi).
Makes perfect sense to me. I have no idea about any of these people, my point was just that “can’t manage to get more than 2 votes in the DNC’s special secret election for special people only to determine the future, God help us, of our country” is, all other things being equal, a point in his favor.
How long do y’all think it’ll be before the Democratic Party is labeled as terrorists and banned
If I had to guess, I would say that won’t happen. I do think that any actual activist organization will be labeled as terrorists and banned and the leaders imprisoned, and that the Democrats will be so thoroughly disenfranchised through a series of various antidemocratic moves that they cannot win again, until some sort of activism comes sufficiently to the front to actively challenge the GOP in ways the current Democrats are simply unable to do. That may happen before the next election, as resistance mounts in the face of increasingly horrifying things Trump tries to do, or it may take 20 years or more of misery and oppression.
I’m not planning on not supporting the Democrats in the meantime, and I would love to be wrong. I’m just saying that I predict they will be fine slotted into their place as performative opposition, as the real repression takes hold. Of course, particular high-profile “bad” Democrats like Biden, Harris, AOC, and so on, will probably be charged with crimes. Whether they will be found guilty and go to prison isn’t clear to me, although having them in some extrajudicial limbo that involves being sent to Gitmo once it’s expanded or something is also a possibility.
I am 0% joking about any of this, if it is not clear.
deleted by creator
Initiating thought process… … ok I see a headline that the DNC did something and I already want to set everything on fire but I am going to do my VERY BEST to reserve the kneejerk reaction and read folx comments and the story and who this dude is… Initial thoughts from the news story: Minnesota, huh? Is this the DNC’s new strategy? When in trouble run for Minnesota politicians? The new improved “Southern Strategy,” if you will? Also, who the hell was the chair before? A Jaime Harrison from South Carolina. Huh, I know nothing about him but I guess the news says his tenure was filled with him arguing with the White House. Wtf does the DNC even do? Break their “code of neutrality” and back shitty primary candidates no one wants. Oh, and they fund raise, ignore constituent’s needs to build campaigns that suck, and do the whole outdated convention bs. Anyway, back to this Martin dude. If the White House was unwilling to listen to Harrison then why would anyone believe a game of musical chairs would fix any of this. The issue is corruption. The democrats are rotten from the inside. The party needs a full restructuring from ground up and at this point, we are very possibly to damned late.