Perez vows to make 2020 transparent amid Brazile revelations

Democratic National Committee (DNC) chairman Tom Perez on Saturday vowed to make the party’s 2020 presidential nominating contest more transparent, after a book authored by the committee’s former interim chairwoman revealed a series of missteps and ethical oversights that roiled the party in 2016.

Perez, who was elected to head the DNC earlier this year, outlined a broad strategy for increasing transparency and unity within the party in a blog post published on the website Medium.

“I am more committed than ever before to restoring voters’ faith in our democratic process because even the perception of impartiality or an unfair advantage undermines our ability to win,” he wrote. “That is unacceptable.”

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Perez said that the party would set the dates for the 2020 Democratic primary debates before all candidates enter the race, in order “to ensure that no candidate participating in our presidential nominating process gains any unfair advantage — real or perceived — during our primary season.”

He also vowed to continue work on the DNC’s Unity Reform Commission, which was established earlier this year to help the party recover from a divisive 2016 primary season that pitted Clinton against Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).

The vow for transparency comes as excerpts from former DNC interim chairwoman Donna Brazile’s upcoming memoir surface in the media. The book, titled “Hacks: The Inside Story of the Break-ins and Breakdowns That Put Donald Trump in the White House,” recalls the blunders and shortcomings of the Democratic Party during the 2016 election.

In the book, Brazile reflects on how Hillary Clinton’s campaign had essentially assumed control of the DNC’s finances in the year before the Democratic primaries even began, and how the contest appeared set up to favor Clinton as the eventual nominee. 

She also reveals that she once considered replacing Clinton and her running mate Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) with then-Vice President Joe Biden and Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) on the party’s ticket, because she believed Clinton had failed to energize working-class voters.