Battle brewing for DNC leadership
By Eli Watkins, Gregory Krieg and Eugene Scott, CNN
November 11, 2016
As Democrats reel in the wake of Donald Trump's stunning victory, a new storm is brewing inside the party as competing factions begin to grapple for its leadership.
Howard Dean, who ran the Democratic National Committee from 2005 to 2009, announced on Thursday he would again seek its top role. Soon after he announced, Vermont Sen.
Bernie Sanders and his top allies began pushing Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison for the role.
But other politicos expressed interest in the job Friday.
Former presidential candidate Martin O'Malley announced that he is throwing his hat in the ring.
"Since the election, I have been approached by many Democrats who believe our party needs new leadership," said the former Maryland Governor. "I'm taking a hard look at DNC Chair because I know how badly we need to reform our nominating process, articulate a bold progressive vision, recommit ourselves to higher wages and a stronger middle class, and return to our roots as a nationwide, grassroots party."
New Hampshire Democratic Party Chairman and DNC Vice Chair Ray Buckley is exploring a run, according to the Boston Globe.
And
Labor Secretary Tom Perez, an outspoken surrogate of Hillary Clinton, is eyeing a run for the job, according to Democrats with knowledge of his plans. A number of Democrats -- especially those interested in someone who can rally the party together after Tuesday's crushing loss -- are floating his name and Perez is said to be receptive, according to people close to him. One upside to Perez, according to people close to him, is that he has limited experience in elected office, something a number of DNC members have raised as red flags for other contenders.
But Sanders -- a registered independent who caucuses with Democrats and fought a lengthy primary battle for the party's nomination this year -- and top allies are
touting Ellison for the job. The Muslim-American congressman currently co-chairs the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
In an email to supporters late Thursday, the Vermont senator said Ellison was uniquely qualified to take on "the political establishment and billionaire class," and that "his experience and perspective would be key to leading the fight against Trump."
Sanders also made the case for the institutional value of the DNC, an organization he and his backers clashed with repeatedly during the primaries.
The current head of the DNC is Donna Brazile, a longtime Democratic operative and former CNN contributor, who is leading in an interim capacity after Debbie Wasserman Schultz resigned on the eve of the convention. Hacked emails appeared to show Wasserman Schultz and other since-departed DNC officials discussing ways to undermine Sanders' effort to oust Clinton in the primary.
Brazile has come under increasing scrutiny after another trove of hacked emails showed her forwarding questions from a town hall jointly hosted by CNN to the Clinton campaign.
MORE: http://www.cnn.com/2016/11/10/politi...ean-dnc-chair/
Howard Dean:is an American politician who served as the 79th Governor of Vermont from 1991 to 2003 and Chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) from 2005 to 2009. Dean was a candidate for the Democratic nomination in the U.S. Presidential Election, 2004. His implementation of the fifty-state strategy as head of the DNC, as well as his campaigning methods during the 2004 presidential campaign, are considered significant factors behind Democratic victories in the 2006 congressional elections and the 2008 presidential election. Afterwards, he became a political commentator and consultant.
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Dean was named chairman emeritus of the DNC upon his retirement.[4] He was mentioned as a possible candidate for Secretary of Health and Human Services[5] and Surgeon General under the Obama administration.[6] Since retiring from the DNC chairman position, Dean has held neither elected office nor an official position in the Democratic Party and, as of 2015, was working for global law firm, Dentons, as part of the firm’s public policy and regulation practice.[7] In 2013, Dean expressed interest in running for the presidency in 2016,[8] but published an op-ed in December 2014 in which he outlined why he would support former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton should she decide to run for president, which she eventually did in April 2015, resulting ultimately in winning the Democratic nomination,[9] but losing the presidency to Republican nominee Donald Trump.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Dean
Keith Ellison:has been the U.S. Representative for Minnesota's 5th congressional district since 2007. He is a member of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party (DFL), the Minnesota state Democratic Party affiliate. The district centers on Minneapolis and surrounding suburbs. Ellison is a co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and a Chief Deputy Whip, also notably serving in the House Committee on Financial Services.
Ellison was the first Muslim to be elected to the U.S. Congress. He is also the first African American elected to the House from Minnesota.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Ellison
Martin O'Malley: is an American politician who was the 61st Governor of Maryland from 2007 to 2015. He previously served as the Mayor of Baltimore from 1999 to 2007, and was a Baltimore City Councilor from 1991 to 1999.
O'Malley served as the chair of the Democratic Governors Association from 2011 to 2013, while being governor of Maryland. Following his departure from public office in early 2015, he was appointed to the Johns Hopkins University's Carey Business School as a visiting professor focusing on government, business and urban issues.
As governor, in 2011, he signed a law that would make illegal immigrants brought to the United States as children eligible for in-state college tuition. In 2012, he signed a law to legalize same-sex marriage in Maryland. Each law was put to a voter referendum in the 2012 general election, and was upheld by the majority of the electorate.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_O%27Malley
Ray Buckley: is a member of the Democratic Party and a politician from the state of New Hampshire. A former state legislator, he currently serves as chair of the New Hampshire Democratic Party, President of the Association of State Democratic Chairs, and as a Vice Chair of the Democratic National Committee.
He is a member of the New Hampshire delegation to the Democratic National Committee, and served as the chairman of the eastern region of the Democratic National Committee from 2001 to 2009. He has also been director of the NH Democratic Senate Caucus, and from 1998 to 2007 served as the City Democratic Chair for Manchester. As of March 25, 2007 he is the state chair of the New Hampshire Democratic Party. Buckley was reelected state chair in 2009, 2011 and 2013.
Buckley served 8 terms (1986–2004) as a member of the New Hampshire House of Representatives where he represented southern Manchester, and served as Party Whip in that body. He was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention from New Hampshire in 1988, 1996, 2000, 2004 and 2008.[7] He served as the vice chair of the New Hampshire Democratic Party from 1999 to March 2007, when he was elected as chair.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Buckley
Tom Perez: is an American politician, consumer advocate, and civil rights lawyer who is the current United States Secretary of Labor. A member of the Democratic Party, Perez has served as the Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division of the United States Department of Justice.
Born in Buffalo, New York, Perez is a graduate of Brown University and Harvard Law School. He worked as a law clerk for the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado before serving in the Department of Justice from 1989 to 1995, where he worked as a federal prosecutor, and as Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights under Attorney General Janet Reno. He worked as a Special Counselor for Senator Ted Kennedy until 1998 when he served as the Director of the Office for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in the final years of the Clinton administration.
Perez was then elected to the Montgomery County (Maryland) Council in 2002, serving as the council's president from 2005, until the end of his tenure in 2006. He attempted to run for the Democratic nomination for Attorney General of Maryland, but was disqualified for not having 10 years of legal experience in Maryland (he was admitted to the Maryland bar in 2001). Perez was appointed by Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley to serve as Secretary of the Maryland Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation in January 2007, until his October 2009 confirmation by the United States Senate as Assistant Attorney General.
On March 18, 2013, Perez was nominated by President Barack Obama to be the United States Secretary of Labor, replacing outgoing Secretary Hilda Solis. He was confirmed by the Senate on July 18 and sworn in on July 23, 2013.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Perez
Donna Brazile (Chair of the Democratic National Committee): is an American author and political analyst. She is a member of the Democratic Party and became interim chairperson of the Democratic National Committee in July 2016. She briefly served as the interim chairperson for the DNC in the spring of 2011 and assumed that role again in the summer of 2016.
She was the first African American to direct a major presidential campaign, acting as campaign manager for Vice President Al Gore in 2000. She has also worked on several presidential campaigns for Democratic candidates, including Jesse Jackson and Walter Mondale–Geraldine Ferraro in 1984, and for Dick Gephardt in the 1988 Democratic primary.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donna_Brazile
