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The DNC owes Bernie Sanders and all Dems an apology

by Brent Budowsky, opinion contributors - 11/02/17 9:40 AM ET

It turns out, according to a shocking new book by former Democratic National Committee interim Chairwoman Donna Brazile, that the fix was in all along. The DNC had a secret deal with the Clinton campaign that made a mockery of the notion that the national party organization should be neutral in presidential primaries.

It also turns out that from the day that Donald Trump was elected until now, the DNC has been guilty of gross negligence and incompetence that has shortchanged Democrats in every state and left the DNC lagging pathetically behind the Republican National Committee at one of the most important political moments in decades.

The DNC owes Bernie Sanders and his supporters an apology if it signed a secret deal in 2015 that sought to fix the 2016 nominating process.

{mosads}The DNC owes every Democrat and party candidates in every state an apology for failing to mobilize Democrats and better support Democratic candidates during an epic political struggle that will have gigantic impact on the nation after the 2018 midterm elections.

Whatever the DNC does in the coming months, a wave of small progressive donors and large donors from Hollywood who support enlightened candidates and causes should engage in massive fundraising and organizing to elect Democrats — especially the highly regarded Democratic nominee to win the open Senate seat in Alabama, Doug Jones, against the horrifically far-right extremist, GOP nominee Roy Moore.

The DNC should bring in a major new player with a proven record of party building, such as former DNC Chairman Howard Dean, to lead a powerful march to the 2018 midterms. It is immaterial whether anyone currently at the DNC stays or leaves.

What matters is that someone like Dean, who was a superb chair of the DNC committed to party building in all 50 states, essentially becomes the DNC czar and is tasked with winning control of the House and Senate in the 2018 midterms.

According to the new book by Brazile, excerpted in Politico, President Obama and his campaign had left the DNC with massive debt after the 2012 campaign, and in August 2015, almost a year before the 2016 Democratic National Convention, the DNC signed a secret deal with the Clinton campaign that gave Clinton virtual ownership over the DNC in return for raising money to pay off the debt.

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In other words, regarding the Democratic National Committee that should represent all Democrats equally and treat all candidates equally throughout presidential primaries, the fix was in before the 2016 primaries had even begun.

Two points are key:

First, the DNC has for some time been so incompetent and ineffective that any DNC-Clinton deal probably did not make much difference in the 2016 primaries.

Second, and more importantly, this DNC-Clinton deal, if it happened as Brazile suggests, was a disgraceful and unethical venture that violated a core principle of the DNC: that it should be neutral in presidential primaries between competing candidates.

The fiasco surrounding the inept DNC continues today. After Trump was elected, there has been a national wave of opposition and resistance that should have yielded a bonanza of fundraising by the DNC, helping Democratic initiatives across the land. It did not.

Instead, throughout 2017, the DNC has lagged light years behind the Republican National Committee in fundraising, in cash on hand and in impact on national politics.

By contrast, the Sanders-affiliated group, Our Revolution, has been mobilizing grass-roots workers and small-donor fundraising behind progressive causes and candidates.

Our Revolution is focused, principled and fighting trim, while the DNC is backward, incompetent and largely irrelevant in the great battle unfolding in the U.S. between the dark politics of President Trump and Americans working to bring about a post-Trump nation.

For this, the DNC owes every Democrat across the nation a sweeping, comprehensive and humble apology.

Democrats must no longer tolerate the ineptitude and irrelevance of the DNC and must demand dramatic changes, including and especially bringing in a major player such as Howard Dean to spearhead a national party campaign to end the one-party Republican control of the House and Senate.

Regardless of the shenanigans of Washington-based Democrats at the DNC, the vast and powerful progressive base should move in overdrive, as it has already begun to do, in support of candidates such as Doug Jones in Alabama and Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-Texas), who has a fair chance of defeating Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas).

The incompetence of the DNC must end. The post-Trump era in America should begin as soon as possible. The way to make this happen is for Democrats to decisively win the midterm elections in 2018. The DNC must be part of the solution, not part of the problem.

Brent Budowsky was an aide to former Sen. Lloyd Bentsen (D-Texas) and former Rep. Bill Alexander (D-Ark.), who was chief deputy majority whip of the U.S. House of Representatives. He holds an LLM in international financial law from the London School of Economics.