#jaime harrison

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Morgan Stephens at Daily Kos:

The Democratic National Committee announced that it’s sending a combined $2.5 million to all 50 state parties for the first time in an effort to influence downballot races in deep-red states, counties, and municipalities. As Politico reported, the historic funding push aims to break Republican supermajorities in state legislatures and strengthen voter engagement. Here are some breakdowns: 

More than $400,000 will be sent to Florida, which the DNC called “‘a priority state that we know Democrats can win,’ focusing on Puerto Rican voter engagement.” 

Missouri will receive $100,000 “to hire organizing staff in hopes Democrats can pick up a handful of seats in the state House and Senate to break a GOP supermajority.” 

The DNC is sending $70,000 to Idaho, “a state that hasn’t elected a Democratic senator in over four decades and where Republicans control every arm of the state government.”

This largesse is thanks to DNC Chair Jaime Harrison, who has raised 25% more money in state party funding during his tenure than previous leaders.  Vice President Kamala Harris led the charge to invest in state and local races in an effort to implement a progressive agenda nationwide. The Democratic presidential nominee sent $25 million of her more than $500 million campaign war chest to downballot races. 

Great news for Democratic Party operations, especially in red states: They are sending a combined $2.5M to all 50 state parties for the purpose of helping out downballot races, especially at the state legislature level.

[tomorrowusa]

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer has endorsed Wisconsin Democrat Ben Wikler to become head of the Democratic National Committee.

Wikler is head of the Wisconsin Democratic Party. Together with Gov. Tony Evers he has reinvigorated the state party over the past 6+ years.

As he vies to lead the Democratic National Committee, Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler has gained an endorsement from the top Democrat in the U.S. Senate. In a statement Thursday morning, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, hailed Wikler as “one of the best state party chairs in the country” and said he’s “what Democrats need right now” on a national level. “Ben possesses all the qualities Democrats across the country are looking for in our next DNC Chair,” Schumer said. “He’s a tenacious organizer — one of the best organizers in the country — a proven fundraiser, a sharp communicator, and able to reach out to all segments of the Democratic Party. Most importantly, he knows how to win.” Wikler has chaired the Democratic Party of Wisconsin since 2019. Before that he worked as a senior advisor and Washington director at the progressive advocacy group MoveOn.org.

I'm a big fan of Wikler and so is Jon Stewart. In case you missed Jon's conversation with Ben a few weeks ago...

In a somewhat unusual move, Ben has a site for his DNC campaign. If any candidates in previous contests have had similar sites then I'm unaware of it.

Ben Wikler for DNC Chair

He even has a campaign slogan: UNITE. FIGHT. WIN.

The DNC chair is elected by the 400+ members of the Democratic National Committee. To support Ben, look up who the chairs of your state party are and contact them. You can also contact Jaime Harrison, the outgoing DNC chair, who has a major say in who succeeds him.

To share your thoughts with Jaime Harrison, visit the Contact page at the DNC. For "category" choose "Feedback/Party Suggestion". Be enthusiastic but polite.

[rosielindy]

I’ve been shouting into the void that was once Twitter trying to get attention from National Dems for Indiana. A couple of my recent posts here for reference and Jaime Harrison’s post about Indiana candidates today. It could easily be a coincidence but I’m counting it as a win either way. 💗💗💗💗

[breakingfirst]

WOW... This guy is a JOKE! 😳⬆️

[the-random-sentence-library]

"For instance, if people are having issues with the Social Security Administration, they would work with staff in a member’s district office."

Quote randomly selected from page 38 of Jaime Harrison and Amos Snead's nonfiction book Climbing the Hill: How to Build a Career in Politics and Make a Difference.

Additional notes: By "member" it means congress member.

Quote was selected at random from a book chosen at random from my local library.

[kevinmmiller]

(via A League of Their Own [Book Excerpt]) - Kevinspolitics.com - Kevin’s Politics Blog

[pepaldi]

Love, love, LOVE!

Love, love, LOVE!

Love, love, LOVE!

LOVE, LOVE, LOVE!!

[oyasuminto]

i demand a list of your submissive and breedable ocs

>:3c

Okay gathered up my more submissive blorbos and organized them from most to least breedable!

Fuwafuwa

Hà Liên

Percy

Cherie

Yohan

Jaime

starbunnies

POLLINICPANIC

Harrison

Finn

[maddiethefashionista]

Where is the lie though?

I like them bloodthirsty! 🤷‍♀️

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Kaia Hubbard at CBS News:

Washington — Party leaders and rising stars will address delegates in Chicago this week as the Democratic National Convention gets underway, with speeches honoring President Biden's time in office while celebrating a new name atop the ticket.  

[...]

Speakers for the 2024 Democratic National Convention

Three presidents, leaders in Congress and other prominent members of the party are expected to address the convention this week as Democrats gear up for November's election. 

Though the full speaker schedule for the entire week has yet to be released, convention officials confirmed the speakers for Monday:

Minyon Moore, convention committee chair

Jaime Harrison, chairman of the Democratic National Committee

Brandon Johnson, mayor of Chicago

Peggy Flanagan, the lieutenant governor of Minnesota

Rep. Lauren Underwood of Illinois

Rep. Robert Garcia of California

Labor leaders Lee Saunders (AFSCME); April Verrett (SEIU); Brent Booker (LiUNA); Kenneth Cooper (IBEW); Claude Cummings Jr. (CWA); Elizabeth Shuler (AFL-CIO)

Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow

Gina Raimondo, Secretary of Commerce

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul

Shawn Fain, president of the United Automobile Workers

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York

Hillary Clinton, former secretary of state and 2016 Democratic nominee

Rep. James E. Clyburn of South Carolina

Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland

Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Texas

Rep. Grace Meng of New York

Women from states with abortion restrictions: Amanda and Josh Zurawski; Kaitlyn Joshua; and Hadley Duvall

Gov. Andy Beshear of Kentucky

Sen. Raphael Warnock of Georgia

Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware

First lady Jill Biden

Ashley Biden

President Biden

The speakers list for Monday's opening session of the #DNC2024 is out, with President Joe Biden and FLOTUS Dr. Jill Biden as the headlining speakers this evening.

Other notable speakers: DNC Convention Committee Chair Minyon Moore, DNC Chairperson Jaime Harrison, Former FLOTUS and former Senator Hillary Clinton, Delaware Sen. Chris Coons, Illinois Rep. Lauren Underwood, UAW President Shawn Fain, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock, and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson.

[creature-wizard]

I've been hearing anecdotal reports from people that Republicans they know are planning to vote for Harris because Trump has gone completely off the deep end.

I'm also seeing YouTube comments from people saying they're Republican and plan to vote for Harris. (Though admittedly, a lot of YouTube comments have to be taken with a grain of salt.)

But - also - a bunch of conservatives turned out for Harris in Florida:

Democratic National Committee (DNC) chair Jaime Harrison said on MSNBC's The Weekend on Sunday, "The Villages is a ruby red—there were 500 golf cart seniors riding around, and probably voted for Donald Trump, previously, supporting Kamala Harris.

So if you're in a red state, don't assume for one minute that your vote won't mean anything. Trump's gone too far for many conservatives, and many of them will be voting blue this election.

[theonion]

Arriving for a campaign strategy session with the vice president and staring in disbelief at her frail, hunched-over form, top Democratic Party officials reportedly began panicking Monday after they discovered Kamala Harris had aged 40 years in a single night. “What the hell happened to her? She was only 59 yesterday,” the visibly distraught DNC chair Jaime Harrison said after the party’s new presumptive nominee began to ask him who he was and then trailed off, her cloudy eyes glossing over beneath a wisp of stark-white hair and her skin now wrinkled and liver-spotted. “She’s been rambling about all kinds of nonsense, and she keeps calling everyone “buster.” No, Madam Vice President, I’m not your stepson, and I’m not here to take you back to California.

Full Story

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Occupy the Democratic National Committee

Picks and Shovels is a new, standalone technothriller starring Marty Hench, my two-fisted, hard-fighting, tech-scam-busting forensic accountant. You can pre-order it on my latest Kickstarter, which features a brilliant audiobook read by Wil Wheaton.

Back in 2017, the Democratic National Committee's lawyers submitted a legal brief that didn't just say the quiet part out loud; they bellowed it: "[The DNC can] go into back rooms like they used to and smoke cigars and pick the [presidential] candidate that way":

https://observer.com/2017/05/dnc-lawsuit-presidential-primaries-bernie-sanders-supporters/

The brief was submitted in the lawsuit between Bernie Sanders and the DNC. Sanders sued over the DNC changing the rules midway through 2016 process in order to sideline him and give the nomination to Hillary Clinton. The DNC's response boiled down to, "Sure, we cheated. So what? We, the committee, are ultimately answerable only to ourselves, and we can choose anyone to lead the party into any election."

The DNC is a weak institution, in other words. There's a universe in which that would be OK. After all, there's a lot of overhead that comes with making strong institutions, all those checks and balances and oversight and transparency soak up resources that you could be using to do other stuff. In an ideal world, a badly run Democratic Party would be spurred to improve after it lost elections, which would result in the defenestration of bad party bosses and the ouster of bad candidates:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/30/weak-institutions/

But the US political system is not an ideal world. In the real world, it's possible for party bosses who pursue disastrous strategies that result in key electoral losses to remain in power. The Democratic Party still rakes in massive donations from people who hate Trump more than they hate the Democratic Party's incompetence. Candidates in gerrymandered safe seats can be wildly incompetent and still hold onto power for improbably long timescales, despite the manifest evidence of their total unfitness for office:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Lipinski

In the absence of real consequences for corruption, incompetence and utter moral turpitude, the Democratic National Committee needs some other form of discipline to get it into fighting form. We need to occupy the DNC, strengthen its institutional safeguards, and turn it into an election-winning, fascism-fighting, extinction-rebelling, worker-defending powerhouse.

Three weeks from now, the DNC will meet in National Harbor MD to elect its new president and officers. Who gets to vote on that? The 448 members of the party's national committee. Who are they? As Micah Sifry writes for The American Prospect, it's a secret, even to the committee members:

https://prospect.org/politics/2025-01-10-opening-dncs-black-box/

No, really. While nominally, members can request a list of their fellow members, the DNC stalls and stonewalls and does everything it can to prevent the committee from communicating in any way they can't control. This is incredible, but it's true. Which is why Sifry has published a leaked list of all 448 members:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1bQKIP3W1NWChRjSbsE0O5k5s7OdgXrJi5-CMfFECIBU/edit?gid=0#gid=0

Looking at the spreadsheet of members, we get a rare glimpse inside the Democratic sausage factory. There's te 73 "at large" members who were voted on as a single block after being handpicked by outgoing president Jaime Harrison. These members are a mix of great people and terrible people, and that's by design: it meant that Sanders and Warren voters could only get their people onto the committee if they voted for some of the most disgusting corporate shills you can imagine.

The fact that the national committee's membership is secret and their communications must pass through a DNC chokepoint means that they get up to all kinds of shenanigans, like at the 2023 summer meeting where they voted themselves the power to throw out any bylaw amendments passed at a national party convention. The vote was whipped by paid DNC staff, creating an atmosphere so poisonous that Jessica Chambers (a rep from Wyoming) called the DNC "the least democratic organization that I’m involved with."

Sifry's breakdown is really useful: he identifies the minority of members who are elected by the party rank-and-file, calling them "the people most responsive to what the base of the party cares about." He also calls out the corporate shills who "buckrake as lobbists," like Donna Brazile, "a partner at “corporate reputation strategy firm.”

But even where state party organizations have elections for their committee members, some states keep the results of those elections a secret. Illinois, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania have 69 members, but the identities of all but 14 of them are a secret.

This is a rotten institution, and that's by design. If you want to know why we can't have nice things – or, you know, a world that's not on fire and haunted by creeping fascism – this is why. The takeover of the DNC won't be easy, but it can't start until we know who the DNC is.

Check out my Kickstarter to pre-order copies of my next novel, Picks and Shovels!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/01/10/smoke-filled-room-where-it-happens/#dinosaurs