Maryland’s National Harbor. This weekend, Democrats will elect the next chair of the Democratic National Committee, marking the first concrete step in moving past their 2024 election defeat.
The members of the party committee will convene on Saturday to elect a new slate of officers, including the replacement for departing chair Jaime Harrison, the former head of the South Carolina Democratic Party whom Joe Biden appointed to run the party while he was in office.
Democrats will choose the next chair of their party, but they will not choose the party’s next leader.
Rather, the future DNC chair will assume control of the organization’s staffing, spending, and fundraising strategies. Over the past four years, the organization has spent slightly under $1 billion. The winner of Saturday’s vote will be more responsible for creating the foundation for a Democratic comeback than for bringing the party back to power, even if the national party organization may act as a home base for a party outside of the White House and helps determine the party’s platform.
Because of this, the contest for chair has evolved from a fight for the party’s soul to a more nuanced discussion between front-runners who share many views and recognize that the next chair will have to deal with the day-to-day operations of party growing rather than making headlines.
According to seasoned Democratic strategist Matt Corridoni, who has worked for the DNC and on a previous bid for DNC chair, “what this person will really be tasked with at the end of the day is planning a primary process, making sure that the state parties have the funding and infrastructure they need to be successful, and planning our next convention.” “This person is more so a custodian, I think, for the nuts and bolts of operating the party than anything else.”
Two Democratic state party leaders from the Midwest, Ben Wikler of Wisconsin and Ken Martin of Minnesota, are claiming the most DNC members’ support in a crowded race. Martin O. Malley, the former governor of Maryland and 2016 presidential candidate, is also vying for the position.
Martin, 51, has led the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party in Minnesota since 2011. Over the course of his more than ten years there, he gained a lot of allies and rose to the position of vice chair of the Democratic National Committee and head of the Association of State Democratic Committees. He frequently brags about how, despite GOP successes in a few other Midwestern blue wall states, his party-building has coincided with Democrats’ unbroken run of statewide victories since he took office.
Martin has positioned himself as a seasoned partygoer who knows how to strike a balance between organizing a great party and trying to restore the party’s reputation.
“Perceptions of the two major parties have shifted for the first time in American history. Nowadays, most Americans think that the Democratic Party is a party of the wealthy and elites, while the Republican Party best serves the needs of the working class and the poor. At an MSNBC forum on Thursday night, he declared, “That is a damning indictment on our party.”
However, he contended that the party doesn’t require a “wholesale abandonment of our message,” but rather a change, as evidenced by the successes of Democratic-aligned ballot measures in red states.
“Anyone saying we need to start over with a new message is wrong,” Martin stated. “Our message is correct. Reestablishing a connection with the electorate and giving them a sense that we are working for the causes they support is what we must accomplish.
After serving as a leader at the progressive movement organization MoveOn.org, Wikler, 43, was elected head of the Wisconsin Democrats in 2019. He became well-known following a series of high-profile wins in the sharply split swing state, including the 2020 presidential election of Joe Biden, the 2022 reelection of Governor Tony Evers, the 2024 reelection of Senator Tammy Baldwin in spite of President Donald Trump’s victory in the state, and the flipping of the state Supreme Court. In the battleground state, he has established permanent campaign infrastructure and promoted it as a template for the party across the country.
Wikler’s campaign has been built on his ability to successfully form a party in Wisconsin as well as his tenacious strategy for regaining the ground Democrats have lost.
“As we reel with shock at the horrors that Trump is visiting on communities across this country, we need a DNC and a DNC chair who is ready to bring the intensity, the focus and the fury to fight back in this moment when our country is reeling and waiting for leadership,” he said at the forum on Thursday.
“I ve done this in Wisconsin, a state rigged to be red,” he said. “I took this action in an effort to stop the Affordable Care Act from being repealed. We will meet right now with the necessary struggle if I am the DNC chair.
The state of the race
Since he first entered the race, Martin has worked to establish himself as the front-runner by swiftly obtaining the support of DNC voting members, with whom he has been associated for over ten years. According to an NBC News count, he has about 200 votes among DNC members who are voting for him, compared to Wikler’s roughly 70 and O Malley’s about 30. Nearly all of the 448 members required to win the position are represented in that group.
With endorsements from seven current governors (including prospective presidential candidates Andy Beshear of Kentucky and Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan), prominent unions, and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Wikler claimed to have gained the public and private support of over 180 DNC members and to be aiming for some late momentum.
The only other contender to highlight the substantial backing of DNC members is O Malley, 62. Since he is the only significant candidate elected to public office, his biography is distinct from those of the other two party leaders. Prior to being Biden’s Social Security administrator, he served as governor of Maryland and then entered the 2016 presidential election.
Speaking to the Poverty Council of the Democratic National Committee on Thursday, O’Malley stated, “I would define our greatness as a nation as when we return to our truest selves and act like it again, seeing the dignity of every single person.”
“We come out of this election an election that cries out for change, cries out for new leadership, cries out for battle-tested leadership that can go head-to-head against an administration that is antithetical to everything that you care about, antithetical to our professed belief as a nation and the dignity of every person,” said O’Malley.
Only a few weeks before the election, Faiz Shakir, a longstanding advisor to Senator Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., who has also worked for other Democratic Party leaders, entered the contest. Despite having a distinctive pitch to head the party among the most prominent candidates, he doesn’t seem to have a lot of support from the DNC members who will make the final decision.
Although the ballot is not secret in theory, DNC members have plenty of time to change their minds because their votes aren’t revealed until after the election. Numerous factors could decide the winner if the contest goes to numerous votes and no contender enters the first ballot with the majority.
The deteriorating reputation of Trump and the Democratic Party following a disheartening presidential election hangs over everything.
There isn’t much disagreement regarding the incoming DNC chair’s responsibilities; the main point of contention is who has the qualifications and style to assist the party present itself in the best possible light.
All of the leading contenders wish to adopt a 50-state approach, which was a defining feature of former chair Howard Dean’s 2005 term (although with a rhetorical flourish to elevate territorial Democratic Party groups, too, a 57-state plan). In order to reach voters who are less connected, they all stress the importance of bringing their message to new media platforms.
And following an election in which they lost ground nearly evenly despite vastly outspending Republicans, all of them have indicated some support for a postmortem examination of Democratic spending.
There is an almost unanimous opinion that the party must do more to keep up with the times, even while none of the major contenders are directly challenging the national party leadership or advocating for a complete overhaul of the organization.
At Thursday’s forum, MSNBC’s Symone Sanders informed the field of chair candidates, “I’m going to start with a show-of-hands question.” Sanders is the anchor of MSNBC’s The Weekend and a former senior adviser to former Vice President Kamala Harris and Biden.
“Who thinks that the Democratic Party, the Democrats, have responded sufficiently to Donald Trump’s almost 11, 10 days in office?” she inquired.
Not a single prominent contender put up their hand.