Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel in an appearance on Fox News on Wednesday said that former interim Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Donna Brazile was “out of line” for telling her to “go to hell” during a segment on the TV network the day before.
“It’s never fun to have your teenagers come home from school and say ‘Hey mom, you’re trending on social media because some woman said you should ‘go to heck,’ ” the GOP chairwoman said Wednesday. “That being said, politics is a contact sport.”
Amid a discussion about Super Tuesday and how it may forecast the Democratic National Convention, McDaniel said that in the scenario of a brokered convention, it “will be rigged against Bernie [Sanders] if those superdelegates have their way on that second vote.”
Brazile immediately lashed back, aggressively defending the party’s nomination process and ultimately telling McDaniel to “go to hell” several times. She also called her criticism “Russian talking points.”
McDaniel said she was referring to a New York Times report from last week that showed some of the party’s superdelegates are considering voting against Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) if no candidate gets the 1,991 delegates needed to win the nomination outright.
“You’ve seen the Democrats change their debate process to include Bloomberg on the stage, and you’ve seen the concerted effort by the establishment Democrats to go after Bernie Sanders,” McDaniel said. “And you know who is saying that the most? Bernie Sanders.
“So, I felt very in my lane saying this is happening. I don’t think it’s something we can’t discuss, and I think her response was a little bit out of line and disproportionate.”
Sanders saw his front-runner status take a hit as former Vice President Joe Biden surged on Tuesday with surprise wins in a number of states after other candidates left the race earlier this week.
Sanders took Tuesday’s top prize, winning in California, but Biden has taken the overall delegate lead after winning in states like Texas, Alabama and Virginia.