All posts tagged "democratic party"

Our parties are dying — here's why it's worse news for Dems

American political parties are in disarray. Instead of being the engines that organize and drive our politics, their roles have been supplanted by partisan social media influencers, nonprofit political groups, super PACs, and the billionaires who fund them and consultant groups they hire.

A few generations ago, it was the political parties that organized politics. In many communities, there was an organic connection between the parties and their members. The parties provided structure and access and some benefits to those who belonged to and participated in their work.

That is no longer the case for most Americans. Today, the parties have become “brands” to which voters are asked to identify, and fundraising vehicles raising money for party operations and the consultant groups who now provide the “services” message testing, voter data files, advertising, and communications.

In other words, the connection between most voters and political parties is largely limited to a loose identification with the brand and to being on lists for fundraising emails, text messages, social media posts, or robocalls asking for money or votes. While these efforts do raise some funds, the amounts pale in comparison to the hundreds of millions contributed by billionaire donors who fill the coffers of the parties and the increasingly powerful liberal or conservative “unaffiliated” interest groups and political action committees.

It has been reported that in the 2024 presidential contest, one of these liberal independent committees raised and spent almost as much as the Kamala Harris campaign (about a billion dollars) on messaging that was sometimes at cross-purposes with the campaign they were supposedly backing. Republican independent expenditure groups did much the same, with one spending a quarter of a billion dollars targeting Arab and Jewish voters with disinformation mailings and ads designed to suppress their votes. In the end, the billions spent by the campaigns and the independent groups deluged voters with messages and counter-messages, causing confusion and alienation.

Even when the parties provided funding to consultants to make personal contact with voters by hiring canvassers to go door-to-door or phone banks to call voter lists, the efforts were perfunctory and unconvincing because the canvassers or callers had no organic ties to the voters they were engaging. This is in marked contrast to decades ago, when the canvassers and callers were local elected party captains engaging their neighbors with whom they had personal ties.

This lack of organic connection with voters, the weakness of the party infrastructures, and the barrage of television, social media, and other forms of digital messaging are some of the reasons why party identification is at an all-time low, with 43% of Americans now identifying as independent, and Republicans and Democrats tied at 27% each.

The parties have also lost their role in governing their electoral operations to the billionaires and interest groups. Look at the role they played in defeating congressional Democratic incumbents in the last election or how billionaire donors are stepping over the will of Democratic voters in New York City’s upcoming mayoral race.

During the primary contest, these interests spent $30 million in advertising to smear and defeat a progressive candidate, Zohran Mamdani. Now, despite Mamdani’s decisive win as the Democratic Party candidate, the same billionaires have pooled their money to support an independent in the November election.

To date, Democratic officials haven’t criticized this move. The party has a rule stipulating that consultants who work against Democratic voter-endorsed incumbents or candidates will not be eligible for party-funded contracts. This sanction has not been applied to those groups that accepted contracts to defeat pro-Palestinian incumbent congressional Democrats, a clear demonstration of the “official” party’s weakness in the face of billionaire spending.

After Democrats lost 1,200 federal and state legislative seats during the Obama era and suffered defeats in two of the last three presidential elections, I was initially optimistic to see two New York Times headlines last week, one of which read, “Democrats Are Mulling a 2026 Campaign Pivot: ‘We Need to Rethink Things.’”

It appears that autopsies are being conducted to understand why Democrats are losing. After reading the piece, however, it became clear that some of the groups conducting the autopsies are the very independent expenditure-funded consultants that are the source of the problem. Their solution: better message testing, better use of social media and digital messaging, etc. In other words, pay us more and we’ll dig the hole deeper. No lessons learned.

What needs to happen and is still not on the agenda is for the parties to reform and reconnect with and earn the trust of voters by rebuilding their state and local infrastructures. There is a push in that direction being made in the Democratic Party by some of its newly elected leaders. Spurred on by party reformers, they have greatly increased the funds being given to state parties, reducing the amounts sent to outside consultants. But as long as the billionaire-funded groups remain the dominant players in the political process, the Democratic reformers will continue to face an uphill battle to wrest back control over elections and party affairs.

Meanwhile, the Republican side appears to be a lost cause. President Donald Trump and his cult-like MAGA movement have been able to take advantage of the weakness of their party’s organization, forcing it to submit and transforming it into a wholly owned Trump subsidiary.

Republicans who opposed Trump’s conquest have either been demeaned and silenced or drifted away to form PACs that have focused their resources on “anti-Trump” advertising campaigns, which, while celebrated by some Democrats, have had no impact on rebuilding the Republican Party.

The bottom line is that American politics has become less a battle between two competing organized political parties and more a contest between billionaire-funded entities waging virtual campaigns attempting to lure voters to endorse their “brands.” Until a significant effort is made to regulate the corrosive role of big money in politics, this will continue as will voter disaffection and alienation.

Dr. James J. Zogby is the author of Arab Voices (2010) and the founder and president of the Arab American Institute (AAI). Dr. Zogby has also been personally active in U.S. politics for many years; in 1984 and 1988 he served as Deputy Campaign manager and Senior Advisor to the Jesse Jackson Presidential campaign. In 2000, 2008, and 2016 he served as an advisor to the Gore, Obama, and Sanders presidential campaigns.

This trust-buster is tearing apart the DNC. Bring it on.

Political activist David Hogg is facing a pretty clear conflict of interest. He’s part of a grassroots organization that will try primarying Democrats out of office in the coming congressional elections. He’s also the vice chairman of the Democratic National Committee. The DNC does many things, but unseating its own people isn’t one of them.

But I think this conflict is beside the point. What David Hogg brings is something that few others bring to the party, which is an unwavering demand for competition. If the DNC is a trust, Hogg is a trust-buster.

That’s such a big problem that DNC chairman Ken Martin is now proposing a rule change that would force Hogg to quit the DNC or quit Leaders We Deserve, the group that has pledged $20 million to challenging "out-of-touch, ineffective" Democratic incumbents.

It’s a microcosm of larger issues that Stephen Robinson has been writing about. He publishes a newsletter called The Play Typer Guy. In this interview, we talked about Hogg, the debate over “oligarchy,” coalition-building and how the Democrats, if they win the House next year, are going to be “expected to draw some form of political blood.”

JS: David Hogg wants to primary incumbent Democrats. He's also vice chair of the DNC. An apparent conflict. But the point is that he's generating energy inside the party. Given your critique of the Democrats, that would probably be a good thing in your view, right?

SR: The DNC should arguably exist to provide accountability for Democrats, not simply protect the weakest and sometimes outright antagonist members. I think back to Kyrsten Sinema, and how she took an immediately hostile approach to the party. She was building a brand as a "maverick" while distancing herself from the party.

That's only possible in a scenario where the party accepts this treatment. Worse, in Sinema's case, no matter how bad she got, the party never took a position against her. Even when she was no longer a Democrat, the party was hesitant to support [now US Senator] Ruben Gallego over her. She had to literally drop out. That just seems sadly passive-aggressive. Democrats need to change the system.

JS: So even if it's correct to say that Hogg is conflicted, he's still bringing competition to the internal functioning of a party that is very much not interested in competition. Is that fair?

SR: Yes, as I mentioned in my own piece, safe districts need competition the most, because otherwise, there is no actual "election." They can stay in office forever without ever engaging with the voters or adapting to new conditions, which is even more critical today.

JS: Where do you stand on the debate over using the word "oligarchy"? Some say normal people get it. Others say it's too academic.

SR: I'm writing something about this as well! A point I make is that Trump frequently called Joe Biden, Kamala Harris and Democrats "Marxists," which is hardly a third-grade reading level concept.

I recall [US Senator] Marco Rubio back in 2021 saying, “‘social justice’ and ‘wokeness’ are just nice names for cultural Marxism, which teaches our children to hate our American history and sow division.” Notice what Rubio does: He acknowledges that “social justice” and “wokeness” sound like good things! So he directly associates it with something bad. He then clearly defines cultural Marxism on his terms. Three years later, your Fox News-watching grandmother who never attended college was reflexively calling Harris a “Marxist.”

Elissa Slotkin definitely stepped on a rake when she said that people didn't understand what “oligarchy” means. In a reality where people are "doing their own research" about diseases on Google, it's obviously not wise to suggest that the average voter doesn't understand a concept that you do. I think it's fine and reasonable to say that a term is silly and even offensive, like Ruben Gallego has remarked about "Latinx." But it's never a good idea to suggest that voters are idiots.

JS: A concern I have heard from Black liberals is that the oligarchy angle writes their interests and history out of the story. Think Bernie Sanders, who says the Democrats should ditch "identity politics" in favor of attacking billionaires. What do you think?

SR: I think Black liberals aren't a monolith. The danger is that the most vocal Black liberals within the Democratic Party are – like myself! – college-educated mainstream middle-aged and older liberals who have reliably voted Democratic for decades. The party's obvious problem is with younger voters of all ages, but specifically Black and Latino men.

I don't think "identity politics" is a winning issue. I think mainstream Democrats perhaps wrongly elevated it in 2016 to distinguish themselves from Sanders' more class-based appeals. That was a mistake. And I'm not even sure how the "oligarchy angle" writes out the interests and history of Black people, considering that rich people screwing over the poor is the backbone of slavery and segregation.

But viewing minority interests as different from working-class people regardless of race is perhaps another mistake. I don't see why you wouldn't want the angle that impacts the greatest number of people. Black voters are 12 percent of the electorate. Voters without a college degree are the majority of the electorate. Elon Musk screwing the poor and working class, regardless of race, is a unifying issue. I disagree with any liberal who argues for dividing a potential winning coalition.

JS: There are stirrings of impeachment. Some say the last two backfired and made Trump stronger. I'm guessing you have an opinion about that.

SR: That argument reflects a core weakness within the Democratic Party. Speaking from my arts background, it's like saying 20 years ago that previous attempts at making Marvel-related movies had failed. Why bother trying again? Execution is everything. Democrats didn't necessarily have a strategy for holding Republicans accountable for supporting Trump. They didn't strike while the iron was truly hot during the second impeachment in deference to Republicans and let him rebuild while in exile -- an issue directly linked to [former US Attorney General] Merrick Garland's delay in prosecuting Trump.

The past is somewhat irrelevant, also, because if Democrats regain the House in 2026, it won't be like 2018. They will be expected to draw some form of political blood.

ALSO READ: ‘Pain. Grief. Anger’: Families heartbroken as Trump backlash smashes adoption dreams

Inside the Democratic National Convention corporate interest moneyfest

CHICAGO — In ballrooms, barrooms and backrooms this week, the business of big business is getting done with Democrats out of public view.

Yes, Bernie Sanders on Tuesday railed before Democratic National Convention delegates about how “millionaires and billionaires” should “not be able to buy elections.” And sure, curtailing “the corrupting influence of money in politics” is a plank in the 2024 Democratic Party platform.

But most Democrats in Chicago are ignoring the socialist senator and stepping over and around that party plank while pursuing cash that corporations and moneyed special interests are all too keen to contribute.

Foremost, there are those who are asking for money.

Take the California Democratic Party, the home state party committee of 2024 presidential nominee Kamala Harris.

For $250,000, a corporation, union, trade association or individual can this week claim a “California gold” sponsorship that entitles the giver to a bevy of benefits, according to a brochure obtained by Raw Story.

Among the perks: membership on the party’s finance committee, "private VIP receptions," eligibility for “special” convention credentials, “priority” lodging and the “opportunity to include items in California delegates' tote bags." One's corporate or organization logo will be “displayed at the California Bash” — a tony party on Aug. 21 at the House of Blues Chicago — and “all four California Delegate breakfasts.”

The Texas Democratic Party similarly offers a $50,000 “Longhorn” package.

In part, it buys a taker “recognition as a title sponsor at our delegation breakfasts & Texas reception,” “one suite in our room block (4 nights)” and “4 guest passes for all Texas delegation breakfasts” and “2 VIP passes to the States Party with access to the Foundation Lounge,” according to a party document appropriately titled “sponsorship opportunities for the 2024 Texas Delegation.”

The Maryland Democratic Party features a $75,000 “Chairman’s Sponsor” package.

For that price, you’ll get “recognition in the Maryland Delegation Hotel and at all 14 Maryland Celebration events” along with a host of other items and honorifics.

And the National Democratic Institute, a nonprofit organization led by former Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle (D-SD), is promoting its “exclusive landmark event space” to “network with global political leaders” and “400 high-level guests” to “build relationships as they address pressing challenges to democracy,” according to an invitation obtained by Raw Story.

Sponsorships of the National Democratic Institute’s week of Democratic National Convention-themed events in Chicago begin at $10,000 and top out at $250,000 — with a top-tier sponsorship landing the “presenting sponsor” a veritable public relations campaign, ranging from “inclusion of corporate materials at events and in registration packets” to an “invitation to meet Senator Tom Daschle and other high-level leaders.”

Sponsors from past Democratic National Conventions include Facebook, Visa, AT&T, oil company Chevron and pharmaceutical company Amgen, according to the invitation.

Raw Story reviews of more than 20 other convention-themed invitations from political committees, political consulting firms, state delegations and politically focused nonprofits yielded similar offers.

Sunlight dims

Democrats don’t want to talk about this lesser-known side of their national convention, where all manner of special interests have a standing invitation to shmooze with party brass and tour the party’s inner sanctum — for a price.

Officials for the California, Texas and Maryland Democratic committees did not respond to multiple emails and phone calls from Raw Story. Nor did officials from the Democratic National Committee.

Why such secrecy?

Accepting big money is inconvenient for Democrats, who have rhetorically railed against the era of unlimited election spending by corporate, union and certain nonprofit interests, which the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission animated.

But just as it does for Republicans, big money keeps Democratic committees competitive in the age of permanent political campaigns. It fuels politicians’ ambitions and helps keep them in power.

Where exactly this Democratic National Convention-adjacent money goes after everyone leaves Chicago often depends on the individual campaign finance laws of each state. It might end up in a federal, or state or ballot measure account. Maybe all of the above. Or somewhere else entirely.

Some of this money will be publicly disclosed, eventually, just as the Democratic National Convention and its host committee must disclose its funders, eventually.

However, some of the money — particularly if it comes from a politically active nonprofit group that may legally avoid disclosing its own funding sources — will remain unknown to average Americans, just beyond the “dark money” realm’s event horizon.

Since the high court’s seminal decision, Democratic leaders have often argued that they cannot “unilaterally disarm” and simply let Republicans bludgeon them with fat stacks of corporate cash. So they’d play the game in hopes of ending the game.

Advocates for good government are decidedly unimpressed at what they consider pay-to-play political ickiness.

"Sponsorship and events funded by corporate interests during both major political party conventions is yet another way that industry is able to peddle influence and overshadow the voices of real people,” said Donald K. Sherman, executive director and chief counsel of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.

“Until Congress actually attempts to do something about this, the conventions will remain the same,” said Jessica Tillipman, associate dean for government procurement law at The George Washington University in Washington, D.C. “I don't see either party willing to step up and take measures to reduce influence peddling if they are not required to do so.

The givers

At most, Democrats’ approach to political money is of academic concern to the givers who, for a relative pittance, snag something far more precious than their five- or six-figure contribution: access.

Proximity to power, while never a panacea, is nevertheless a ticket to emails answered, phone calls returned, meetings scheduled and honored. It’s a tool for favorable regulations and prod for advantageous legislation. In a pinch, it’s a weapon against naysayers.

Invest a little now, get a lot later. Make friends, influence people, plan for a rainy day when the government seems more against you than with you.

Raw Story contacted more than 40 corporations and trade associations that, according to federal data compiled by nonpartisan research organization OpenSecrets, spent at least $1 million on federal-level lobbying efforts last year or are on pace to do so this year,

The vast majority of them did not respond to multiple requests for comment on whether they, in any form or fashion, supported the 2024 Republican or Democratic national conventions, or sponsored any political committee, state delegation or policy organization participating in convention festivities.

Chicagoland-based corporate giants McDonald’s Corporation and Allstate Insurance Company had nothing to say. Nor did Microsoft, Boeing, Pfizer, Apple, Comcast, Visa, Verizon, CVS, UPS, FedEx, Honeywell, The Walt Disney Company, Salesforce, TikTok, defense contractor RTX and Facebook parent Meta.

ExxonMobil co-sponsored a Democratic National Convention side event staged by Punchbowl News — one disrupted by climate activists. (The oil giant did not immediately respond to a request for comment.)

“We don’t have any comment,” said Megan Ketterer, a spokesperson for AT&T, whose logo could be found on kiosks, credential lanyards and signage in and around the Democratic National Convention.

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Lockheed Martin responded to a Raw Story inquiry that included several detailed questions about the defense contractor’s participation in the 2024 convention.

Sort of.

A company spokesman, who declined to be named, first had questions for Raw Story: How many companies and special interest groups did Raw Story contact? Which ones? Did they respond?

In the end, Lockheed declined to answer most of Raw Story’s questions and emailed a statement: “We plan to attend both the Democratic and Republican conventions as part of our long-standing approach of non-partisan political engagement in support of our business interests.”

Raw Story persisted: “Are you able to offer any specifics on how you plan to support your business interests at the conventions? How much money does Lockheed Martin plan to spend between the two 2024 national party conventions?”

“We don’t have anything else to share,” the spokesman replied.

Chicago-based United Airlines — namesake of the United Center, where the Democratic National Convention is being conducted — said in a statement that the company “supported both the Milwaukee and Chicago Host committees” and increased the number of flights between Washington, D.C., and the two 2024 national convention cities.

Asked for additional details, United demurred: “We won’t have any further information to share.”

Similarly, a Google spokesperson, who declined to be named, noted that the company did not donate to either the Democratic or Republican convention committee, but helped “both the Republican and Democratic committees livestream their conventions on YouTube – like we have in previous elections.”

The Google spokesperson declined to comment on support Google did or did not offer state delegations, political committees and the like in conjunction with the Democratic or Republican national conventions.

A Walmart spokesperson said the company didn’t donate to either the Democratic or Republican convention funds but declined to comment further.

Some of the nation’s top lobbying forces were a bit more forthcoming.

“GM will sponsor the Democratic National Convention,” General Motors spokesperson Liz Winter confirmed. “We have supported both conventions for many years and aim to provide equivalent support to both the RNC and DNC. Through continuous bipartisan engagement with organizations like the Republican National Committee and Democratic National Committee, we have an opportunity to build an understanding of the issues important to our industry, our people and the communities we support.”

She added: “Our presence at the conventions does not represent an endorsement of a candidate.”

A few said they simply sat the 2024 national political conventions out.

Wells Fargo “did not contribute to either convention,” bank spokesman Robert Sumner said, adding, “no events, either.”

“We have not contributed for activities at the political conventions,” said Brian Dietz, spokesperson for trade group NCTA – The Internet & Television Association.

The National Federation of Independent Business has “not contributed any money / sponsorships or in-kind contributions to either the RNC or DNC conventions,” spokesperson Jon Thompson wrote in an email.

But the party never ends

When the Democratic National Convention ends Thursday night, and the final Democratic revelers stagger back to their downtown Chicago hotel rooms, there will have been hundreds of individual events and opportunities for wealthy special interests to leave their mark.

To take one: Invariant, a government relations and communications firm that lists Home Depot, H&R Block, Toyota, Marriott International and Cigna among its clients, hosted an “exclusive brat brunch” on Tuesday attended by “media personalities, influencers, administration honchos, Members of Congress, campaign staff diehards, and your friends at Invariant," according to an invitation shared with Raw Story.

Among those personally invited: Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL), per an invitation.

It’s unclear whether the congresswoman attended. But as Politico would report afterward, a roster of other federal lawmakers sure did, mingling with lobbyists and activists and lots of folks with political agendas.

Invariant did not return requests for comment. But based on a question it poses on its website to potential clients, the event appeared to accomplish the firm’s mission.

“There are only two questions when it comes to lobbying,” Invariant posits. “Do you want to find Washington, or do you want Washington to find you?”

How Gaza protesters plan to roil the Democratic National Convention

With the Democratic National Convention slated to start days from now in Chicago, many in the party are thrilled to channel a sudden burst of energy surrounding Vice President Kamala Harris — who is already certified as the presidential nominee — and emerge unified in taking a “joyful” fight to Donald Trump in the general election.

But it won’t be that easy.

The ongoing carnage of Israel’s war in Gaza and the threat of a widening war throughout the Middle East raises a profound note of discord amid what party leaders want to be a harmonious gathering.

Protest against the Biden-Harris administration’s support for Israel is expected inside and outside Chicago’s United Center, where the Democratic National Convention will take place.

In interviews with Raw Story this month, pro-Palestine convention delegates, who together represent hundreds of thousands of voters who withheld their votes from Joe Biden during the primaries, indicate they’ll press the case on the convention floor for a ceasefire and arms embargo against Israel.

ALSO READ: Why ‘vanilla’ Tim Walz is the ingredient to beat Trump: Dem lawmakers

Meanwhile, in the surrounding streets, potentially thousands of protesters — some radicalized by the experience of police crackdowns against pro-Palestine college campus encampments earlier this year — are angling to the Biden-Harris administration for propping up what they consider the worst human rights atrocity of the 21st century.

An insistent demand to account for the Gaza dead will be heard, they say, a Democratic Party unity-fest be damned.

“I do think it’s important to see that this movement is not fringe,” Asma Mohammed, an uncommitted delegate, told Raw Story. “It’s full of people across the country who are considering whether they’re going to show up at the polls at all.”

And while Mohammed said the uncommitted delegates are not coordinating with the protesters outside the convention hall, she said she hopes their voices will be heard by presumptive nominee Kamala Harris.

“We are trying to get these demands met so that our people do not have to be in the street demanding change at the risk of being arrested, at the risk of being maced, at the risk of being chased by police,” Mohammed said. “It’s terrifying to have to do that. We want Kamala Harris to see that we are willing to do that to save the lives of people in Palestine.”

The specter of violence has loomed over the convention, with the 1968 Democratic convention as a cautionary tale of police overreaction turning protests into bedlam and the party emerging fractured and weakened. The city repaired some of its reputation with a Democratic convention that went off without a hitch in 1996, but Chicago experienced significant unrest during protests in the summer of 2020 over the murder of George Floyd.

The two camps of pro-Palestine advocacy at this year’s Democratic convention are raising almost identical demands, but the stakes for each are wildly different.

Many of the pro-Palestine activists in the “uncommitted” movement work in organizations that advocate for goals that benefit working people, such as school funding. They can’t necessarily afford to alienate Democratic Party officials, including Harris’ recently announced running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.

But protesters with no ties to the party may feel they have nothing to lose. By the very nature of a national convention — and with images of the Democrats’ violent 1968 convention in Chicago firmly in mind — thousands of people with varying agendas are converging in one place at the same time, with the potential for confusion and unpredictable results.

Here’s what you should prepare for.

Inside the convention hall: ‘uncommitted’ to Harris

Thirty uncommitted delegates across Michigan, Minnesota and Hawaii — those who are not supporting Harris — are going into the convention with two demands that appear highly unlikely to be met: an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, and an arms embargo against Israel.

They are also requesting a meeting with Harris and calling for the Democratic National Committee to provide a five-minute speaking role to Dr. Tanya Haj-Hassan, a pediatric intensive care physician who has witnessed the war up close by working in a hospital in Gaza.

They are further asking for space at the convention for a daily vigil, and for programming such as a panel discussion or debate about the different views within the party on the war between Israel and Hamas, which governs Gaza. Israel has been fighting Hamas for more than 10 months after Hamas militants attacked and killed more than 1,100 people in Israel — mostly civilians — and kidnapped more than 200 others.

“Folks are asking if we’re going to endorse Harris,” Mohammed told Raw Story. “Until we have that meeting, there’s no chance of us feeling there’s any alignment in our values.”

So far, the Harris-Walz campaign has not responded to the request for a meeting. The Democratic National Committee likewise has given no indication as to whether an advocate for Palestine will receive a speaker slot.

The Harris-Walz campaign and Democratic National Committee did not respond to messages from Raw Story seeking comment.

A Democratic Party platform draft released last month gives pro-Palestinian protestors little purchase, as it states that the Democratic Party’s commitment to Israel’s security is “ironclad,” as is its commitment to Israel’s “its qualitative military edge” over enemies.

Colin Kahl, a former under secretary at the U.S. Department of Defense, who co-wrote the section of the platform that addresses the Middle East, emphasized during a meeting of the platform committee last month that the document reflects Biden and Harris’ belief in “the worth of every innocent life, whether Israeli or Palestinian.”

Elianne Farhat, co-chair of the National Uncommitted Movement, had previously addressed the committee while raising the demand for a ceasefire and arms embargo.

“I don’t believe that language would be in there without the organizing of the uncommitted movement,” she said. “If that’s their attempt to placate us, it is wholly insufficient.”

Mohammed downplayed the possibility of disruption inside the convention hall.

ALSO READ: We asked 10 Republican senators: ‘Is Kamala Harris Black?’ Things got weird fast.

“We’re people with roles within the party,” she said. “We want to ensure that we’re following the rules in the party.”

She added that simply being elected as delegates on behalf of the 10,000 people who voted uncommitted in the Michigan primary “is an act of protest.”

Others in the uncommitted movement have suggested that even if the Democratic Party doesn’t meet their demands, that doesn’t mean pro-Palestine voices won’t be heard within the United Center.

Layla Elabad, a community organizer in Michigan, told Mother Jones that even if Dr. Haj-Hassan doesn’t receive a formal speaker slot, “we’ll find a way for her to speak, one way or another, in the tradition of Fannie Lou Hamer, who made a moral witness to human suffering at the 1964 DNC.”

Hamer was the co-founder of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, which sought to be recognized in place of the all-white official delegation at the 1964 Democratic convention. Hamer’s speech to the credentials committee was televised for a national audience and vividly described the horrors of racial segregation in the South.

Outside the convention hall: a militant left

For their part, protest leaders who won’t be credentialed inside the convention hall have made it clear that they hold the Biden-Harris administration responsible for the death toll in Gaza — more than 39,000 people by late July, according to Palestinian health authorities.

And on this specific issue, they make no distinction between the Democratic Party and the Republican Party.

“Our aim is to bring together tens of thousands of people to call for ending genocide and ending U.S. aid to Israel,” Faayani Aboma Mijana, a spokesperson for the Coalition to March on the DNC, told Raw Story.

But Mijana said these protesters are not looking for strategic allies inside the convention hall. They acknowledged there are elected officials in the Democratic Party “who are friendly to what we’re trying to do,” but the one person they cited as an example — Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) — was knocked out in her primary on Tuesday by an opponent who received heavy financial backing from pro-Israel lobbying groups.

“We know the source of change is not going to come from within the party,” Mijana said. “Our focus is on building a mass movement outside of Washington. The change is not going to come from within the parties; it’s going to be brought about by the movement outside of it.”

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The protesters have pledged to do their part to minimize the risk of violence, while the Chicago police have signaled they will draw a hard line against unrest.

Mijana said protest leaders are planning a “peaceful, family friendly” event that will be inclusive of everyone, regardless of immigration and disability status. Similar to the protest against the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee last month, the Chicago protest leaders are securing permits and plan to utilize marshals to guide protesters and de-escalate and potentially confrontations with counter-protesters.

Chicago police Superintendent Larry Snelling warned during a press conference last month: “Physical responses to violence and civil unrest on the part of those who come here with plans to damage the city or reputation of the city or to hurt people — the response is never going to be pretty. But it will be constitutional.”

Palestine is front and center in the March Against the DNC, planned for the first and final days of the convention, although protesters are also highlighting mass incarceration, the crackdown on undocumented immigrants, and women’s and LGBTQ+ rights.

While Mijana said organizers are committed to keeping protesters safe, the potential for convention-related chaos to usher in a second Trump administration is simply not a factor in their considerations.

“Our view is, how much worse can it get?” they told Raw Story. “There’s already a genocide that’s killed 40,000 people. An entire city of 2 million people has been displaced. People are starving. People are being raped and tortured. It’s already the worst human rights atrocity of this century.”

James Zogby, pollster and founder of Arab American Institute, likewise expressed deep concern about “40,000 people dead — at least,” noting that “people are upset and have a right to be.”

But Zogby cautioned that “people also have the need to be responsible in that we are winning the public relations war.

“There’s far greater sympathy among Democrats towards the Palestinians and what they’ve endure. There’s far greater support for change in policy,” he told Raw Story in a phone interview. “We have to be careful in how the demonstrations unfold so that they make a point to move forward support instead of alienating potential allies. I’m not sure everyone has that goal. They’re using slogans like ‘Genocide Joe’ and ‘Killer Kamala. That’s not helpful.”

The 1968 analogy

Both protesters and pro-Trump forces watching the convention from the sidelines have leaned into the 1968 analogy, while the pro-Palestine forces planning to attend the convention have vowed they will not be bullied into silence in the name of preserving party unity.

“It’s something that we are hyper-aware of, is ’68, and it’s something we’ve been constantly thinking about and talking about,” said Danaka Katovich, co-director of activist group Code Pink, during a group webinar on Aug. 1 while discussing planning for the protests. “We’ve identified this DNC as a leverage point, something to take advantage of, especially with the internal political strife in the Democratic Party.”

As early as this spring, Christopher Rufo, a conservative intellectual credited with weaponizing “critical race theory” and “diversity, equity and inclusion” as culture-war smears against the left, has identified the protests against the war in Gaza as a new point of attack against Democrats. Ignoring the antipathy between the party and the protesters, Rufo and other conservative strategists hope to create a linkage in the minds of swing voters between radical left-wing protesters and the Democratic Party.

In an essay titled “The Left’s Hamas Problem that he published in April, Rufo wrote: “The encampment escalation divides the left, alienates influential supporters, and creates a sense of chaos that will move people against it. The correct response from the right is to create the conditions for these protests to thrive in blue cities and campuses…. If these protests become more volatile and go all the way to the Democratic convention in Chicago, we could see a 1968 scenario. That didn’t work out too well for the Democrats.”

Police clash with protesters outside the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago. (Courtesy: C-SPAN)

It also didn’t work out well for the antiwar movement.

Bill Ayers, a former Students for a Democratic Society leader who protested the 1968 Democratic National Convention, cited one success in his remarks during the Code Pink webinar. The police response stripped away any illusions the protesters might have that American power could be bent towards good, he said.

“What we succeeded in was showing the system for what it was,” Ayers said. “It was a militarized, militaristic response to protesters who simply wanted their voices to be heard to stop a genocide. And what did they do? They had a police riot. So, we showed the world: This is what American power rests on. I think it was a huge success.”

But Ayers readily acknowledged that the 1968 protests completely failed in a material sense.

“We did not end the war in 1968,” he said. “A million people were dead, but the war ground on, and [National Security Adviser] Henry Kissinger and Richard Nixon expanded the war…. It went on for another… seven years. So, we can’t claim a huge victory…. What we set out to do was end a genocidal war, and we did not do that…. We didn’t stop the war, and that was our minimum program.”

While the parallels between 1968 and 2024 are striking, there are also notable differences.

The Democratic Party was far more divided in 1968, with hopes for a “peace” candidate dashed first by the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy coupled with party leaders sidelining Eugene McCarthy at the convention.

In contrast, when Joe Biden dropped out of the race last month, Democrats quickly coalesced around Harris. And unlike in 1968, when eventual Democratic nominee Hubert Humphrey came from the pro-war faction of the party, Harris is acknowledged among protesters as being more sympathetic to the plight of the Palestinian people than Biden.

Medea Benjamin, co-founder of Code Pink, remarked during the Aug. 1 webinar that beyond the antiwar movement, voters who would ordinarily be supportive of the Palestinian cause are likely to rally around Harris “because of their fear of Trump.”

Farhat, the co-chair of the National Uncommitted Movement, declined to speculate on what strategies uncommitted delegates might employ to press their case inside the convention hall. But she said they’ll be recruiting so-called “ceasefire” delegates among those committed to the nominee “to be part of a visible presence for Palestinian lives.”

And, she said, their efforts won’t end with the convention.

“Uncommitted delegates are very clear on who they are representing,” she said. “That’s the more than 700,000 voters who voted in the primaries. That’s who we are representing, and we will stay true and focused on being accountable to them, as well as the Palestinian leadership — to not give up ground on this critical issue.”

Editor's note: Following publication of this story, the Uncommitted National Movement confirmed in a press release that two leaders met with Vice President Kamala Harris and Gov. Tim Walz before their rally in Detroit on Wednesday.

According to the leaders, Layla Elabed and Abbas Alawieh, Harris "shared her sympathies and expressed an openness to a meeting with Uncommitted leaders to discuss an arms embargo."

Phil Gordon, Harris' national security advisor, said in an apparent response to the Uncommitted leaders in a post on X on Thursday that Harris "does not support an arms embargo on Israel" and "will continue to work to protect civilians in Gaza and to uphold international humanitarian law."

Passing the torch: a poem

Dear Joe, you’ve got a choice to make
It’s not easy; there’s no magic.
Be a hero for your wisdom
Or become a figure tragic.

You say you need to keep the job
To finish what you started.
But the job has been ongoing
Since from England we were parted.

We’re a project that’s in progress;
We’ve final victory never caught.
And for every generation
There are battles to be fought.

To make progress with the project
Can’t depend on just one man.
The torch has got to be passed on;
Must go from hand to hand.

George Washington, when he withdrew,
Said t’was time to pass the torch.
He said, like Cinncinnatus,
He’d retire to his porch.

Now its time for you to step aside,
Pass on the team baton.
You must let some other leader
This long battle carry on.

Carolyn McGiffert Ekedahl is the former deputy inspector general for inspections at the Central Intelligence Agency and co-author of “The Wars of Eduard Shevardnadze.”

'Backroom coup': Scathing editorial hammers years-old Biden flub that cripples replacement

President Joe Biden’s disastrous debate performance was made much worse by another catastrophic decision he made years ago, according to a scathing rebuke from the Wall Street Journal Monday.

The conservative newspaper first hit out at media coverage, accusing the columnists now demanding Biden step aside of shrugging off the president’s problems for months.

But it then took aim at Biden’s own judgment, which it claimed has left the Democratic Party in a much deeper hole if the decision is made that Biden step down.

The signs of Biden’s decline have been obvious long before his stumbling performance against Trump Thursday, the Journal's editorial board wrote.

“The Democratic press barely questioned Mr. Biden’s limited workday, his reliance on a teleprompter, and his rare unscripted media interviews," it wrote.

“'Eighty is the new 40,' press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said last year. 'Didn’t you hear?' Ms. Jean-Pierre said in 2022 that Mr. Biden displays such stamina that she, not yet age 50, 'can’t even keep up with him.' Conservatives mocked this but the press laughed it off.”

ALSO READ: Rep. Byron Donalds, his gigantic Jim Crow myth and a forgotten fact about Black voters

But the editors added, “So it is with the new establishment chorus after Thursday’s debate that President Biden should withdraw his candidacy for a second term. Suddenly, the columnists and editorial pages that denied the truth are sounding like these columns.”

“The problem is that Democrats are now left with a likely nominee who is in obvious mental decline, and a Vice President in Kamala Harris who is even less popular than Mr. Biden.”

The editorial launched into a relentless attack on Harris, and on Biden’s judgment for choosing her as his vice president — and making his chances of stepping down much more difficult.

“The path out of this nightmare might be easier if not for another problem the press refused to recognize — that Kamala Harris wasn’t remotely qualified to be Vice President when Mr. Biden chose her,” it wrote.

“He had promised to pick a woman as his Vice President, and Mr. Biden selected Ms. Harris because she was a woman of color, not because of her qualifications.

“Ms. Harris had bombed as a presidential candidate, washing out after she couldn’t defend her own Medicare plan at a primary debate. She had risen to the Senate based on patronage. Yet she was hailed by Democrats and the press as the first woman of color on a national ticket, as if this were more important than someone who could do the job. Criticism of her failures on immigration, or of her frequent word salads, was said to be racist or sexist.

“... The press is now reporting that one reason Mr. Biden chose to run for re-election was fear that Ms. Harris couldn’t defeat Mr. Trump.”

Now, the editorial concluded, if Biden steps down and the Democratic Party scramble to find a replacement who could beat Trump, it leaves itself open to, “Appearing to bypass the first minority woman Vice President in a backroom coup.

“This is what happens when a party puts identity politics above governing experience and political skill.”

Expand the Supreme Court? Senate Democrats are holding out, and activists are livid

WASHINGTON — Support for expanding the size of the Supreme Court continues growing at all levels of the Democratic Party.

Except one crucial one: the U.S. Senate — an institution brimming with elderly institutionalists who are about to hear an earful from those who want to add justices in a bid to pull the current court’s ideological tilt from the right back toward the center. Abortion, voting, guns and LGBTQ issues are at the top of their minds.

“We want to make sure that we are bringing the real-life impact on our patients and the people who are most impacted, bringing those stories forward for senators in 2024 and beyond,” Jacqueline Ayers, Planned Parenthood’s senior vice president for policy, campaigns and advocacy, told Raw Story. “As advocates, our role is going to be continuing to make sure that we're pushing the conversation forward.”

In a sea change, the majority of Democratic voters, dozens of grassroots organizations and many House Democrats, including constitutional lawyer Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), are now pushing to expand the current nine-member Supreme Court by four seats.

Instead, in the wake of recent reports from ProPublica revealing billionaire donors lavished Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito with free gifts and lodging, the Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled this week to consider reforms that would force justices to adopt a code of ethics and enable everyday Americans to lodge formal complaints against members of the high court.

It’s not nearly enough for some.

RELATED ARTICLE: Mitch McConnell defends Clarence Thomas

While advocates, like Demand Justice co-founder Christopher Kang, are praising Whitehouse and Senate Judiciary Chairman Dick Durbin (D-IL) for “finally seeing Congress has a role and it needs to assert itself” Kang says increased disclosure alone falls short.

“I do think that at the end of the day, forcing Clarence Thomas to fill out more paperwork and disclose what trips he’s going on is not going to solve the problem of the Supreme Court,” Kang told Raw Story.

The court’s 2022 Dobbs decision that upended Roe v. Wade was a wakeup call to many Democrats and independents, but these advocates say the problem is deeper and wider. Kang says the Supreme Court has all but barred Congress from re-authorizing the Voting Rights Act, overturned local gun reform efforts, ended affirmative action and blocked student debt relief for 43 million Americans.

“The court is inserting itself and taking power away from the other two branches of government, and its excuse is ‘separation of powers,’ and I think that that has been also the excuse they’ve been using around ethics reform,” Kang said. “I think the first step is ethics, but then that naturally leads to even more institutionalist Democrats in Congress coming around to saying that we also need to reassert the balance between the branches of government by expanding the court.”

‘Fresh leadership’

Demand Justice is far from alone. The group has more than 65 allies among federally elected officials for expanding the size of the Supreme Court now occupying historically stuffy offices on these slave-built Capitol grounds, but only three of them are senators.

“We are an archaic institution with tradition that is often discriminatory entrenched in how we operate, so it takes the strongest crowbar imaginable to move people,” Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) told Raw Story.

The American people are crying out for “fresh voices, new fresh leadership,” according to Bowman, who argues fresh leaders need freshened up institutions.

“We are a more diverse, complex, larger country than we've ever been. So we need to look at everything with fresh eyes, especially the Supreme Court,” Bowman said. “Seven-thousand cases are submitted to the Supreme Court every year, they hear 80 of them. They're not responding to the American people, just in terms of a numbers perspective.”

As with all things, the progressive movement is far from monolithic, even in Congress. President Joe Biden was “Senator Biden” for his first 36 years in Washington and remains an institutionalist’s institutionalist — and a court-packing skeptic — which is why Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) doesn’t think expanding the Supreme Court should be the party’s top priority.

“Personally, while I am supportive of expanding the court, I think we should be focusing on where there's more immediate possibility,” Ocasio-Cortez told Raw Story.

Ocasio-Cortez says as long as Biden is in the White House and Democrats control the Senate, the party’s main focus needs to be making the case to the American people.

“I think it'll be a lot easier to kind of ramp up activity on the Judiciary Committee, for example, in securing further investigation into the court’s misconduct than it is to try to get dozens of senators to agree to expanding the court when the president’s already spoken out against it,” Ocasio-Cortez said.

SCOTUS ethics reform ‘possible’

That’s in line with what Senate Democrats – even over Republican cries of, “foul!” – are attempting as they move ahead with ethics reform this week.

“What we're trying to do is to proceed within the realm of the possible,” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), the sponsor of the reform package, told Raw Story. “The key step is to get the facts before there are people, and that will help determine the aperture for ambition.”

Some Senate Democrats are open to it, but they say now isn't the time.

“We've contemplated it for years. To me, what seems the most urgent is an enforceable code of ethics at the Supreme Court. It's not partisan – just long overdue,” Sen. Alex Padilla (D-CA) told Raw Story.

Many longtime Democrats, such as Sen. Tom Carper (D-DE), have never even considered expanding the court.

“No. A lot of people have contemplated it over the years, including FDR,” Carper told Raw Story. “The problem here is the lack of ethical guidelines and the failure to comply with what I think are common sense, reasonable guidelines.”

Senate Democrats are going by the old Washington playbook, though, according to the grassroots and their progressive allies in Congress who accuse Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) of burning that playbook when he was majority leader.

While AOC and others will be making the case for a corrupt court on cable, social media and in-person, other progressives expect senators to hear calls to expand the court coming from all levels of the party soon.

“When we are able to get local elected [officials] and community leaders and people on the ground, those are the ones that push up,” Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) told Raw Story. “They're the ones that are mobilizing every day and they're the ones that are reaching out in those communities. So, hopefully, pinpointing those Democrats that we really want to get on our side right now, hopefully, some of the effort they'll be looking at.”

The grassroots doesn’t just want Democrats to see their efforts – they’re set on making them feel their presence, displeasure and pain.

‘We are definitely coordinating’

No need for a new playbook, either. It’s worked before.

“Every event that Elizabeth Warren was at – you know, actually, every Dem candidate – we had folks there asking questions about expansion,” Julia Peter, co-director of advocacy and mobilization at the Center for Popular Democracy, told Raw Story. “The folks in Iowa, most of them either lived in Iowa or the Midwest and were traveling in for campaign events. Same for New Hampshire, South Carolina, etc.”

In 2018, the Center for Popular Democracy started calling for court expansion. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) opposed Supreme Court expansion during her presidential primary bid in 2020. The following year, she joined the grassroots she’d heard so much from on the trail and backed an expansion plan. Warren knows her colleagues won’t be able to hold out forever.

“The Senate is full of people who are elected, and that is the ultimate accountability. As more people across this country become more alarmed about the Supreme Court, we'll see more movement in the U.S. Senate,” Warren told Raw Story.

Warren is still a lonely voice calling out in the wilderness. Sens. Tina Smith (D-MN) and Ed Markey (D-MA) are her allies. They’re all bullishly – naively, to critics both inside and outside of the Democratic Party – optimistic, if in their muted-senatorial way.

“Piece by piece we’re building a powerful coalition of groups that are going to be demanding change,” Markey told Raw Story. “Dobbs is just a preview of coming atrocities and each new judicial atrocity is gonna create a demand that we expand the court. And so, it will happen. It’s inextricable, it’s inevitable that we will get many more members calling for an expansion.”

The coalition is increasingly optimistic, even if they know they’re still laying the groundwork ahead of 2024 and beyond.

In May, Markey, Warren and Smith, along with Reps. Hank Johnson (D-GA), Adam Schiff (D-CA) and Cori Bush (D-MO), introduced the Judiciary Act of 2023, which would expand the Supreme Court’s membership from nine justices to 13 justices. Advocates expect a little pressure to go a long way.

“Elizabeth Warren being such a huge champion on the issue really happened fast, and I do think it was the grassroots push,” Peter said. “But it wasn’t a lot. Sometimes people overestimate these things, and I don’t think that building momentum in the Senate is unachievable. And I do expect in the next year to get a lot more cosigners on that bill.”

This time, it’s not one progressive group here and a fringe-left professor over there – it’s a 40-plus coalition of advocacy groups are coming together, including the likes of Planned Parenthood, NARAL, National Action Network, Color of Change, Latino Victory and more than a dozen gun reform advocacy groups.

“We are definitely coordinating,” Peter said, though she and the others say there’s nothing top-down about the effort. “The grassroots movement is growing. In a lot of ways, the Supreme Court is making it easier and easier. With every egregious decision that comes, more people are paying attention.”

In just more than a week, on July 24 and July 25, advocates from over a dozen states are taking part in a lobby day on Capitol Hill on voting access. Voting rights come through the Supreme Court.

“We’re also going to focus on the freedom to vote, but The Judiciary Act will be a big topic in all of those meetings,” Peter said.

Then, during Congress’ annual August recess – a hallowed time for politicians and advocates alike – they plan to pressure other Democrats, especially Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) and others.

“We want to pressure Dem leadership. We are looking to Schumer and Jefferies to first endorse, and then take this on,” Peter told Raw Story. “I don’t know if we’re ready to say too much, but we’ve got some big stuff planned over August recess kind of targeting them on expansion. So, I do think that’s a big piece of it.”