Just weeks after suffering crushing defeats in elections for the U.S. House, Democrats are pressuring their party to fire the people brought in to save them, for not being racially diverse.
“(I)ncoming Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chair Sean Patrick Maloney (N.Y.) is drawing early warnings from some colleagues as he taps Pennsylvania-based strategist Tim Persico, a white man, as the committee’s top staffer for the 2022 election cycle,” POLITICO reports.
“Persico, a former chief of staff in Maloney’s office, is deemed by many to be seasoned operative with the requisite experience for his new job. But the committee did not conduct an extensive search before landing on him as the new executive director. And some members have already declared that they will speak out if his subsequent hires are not people of color,” POLITICO adds.
Persico’s hiring is even more controversial, as some liberals accuse him of conspiring to defeat a black progressive.
“Newly elected DCCC chairman Sean Patrick Maloney named as his top staffer on Tuesday Tim Persico, a longtime party operative who drew fire in 2018 when he was deployed to Pennsylvania to persuade a black progressive pastor, Greg Edwards, to run for local office instead of Congress. Edwards told local news at the time that Persico viewed former Bethlehem Mayor John Callahan, a white man, as the party’s strongest candidate even though Edwards had posted strong fundraising numbers,” the Washington Free Beacon reports.
“It’s a shame that the DCCC and the wealthy white donors and revolving door consultants that make up the Democratic Party establishment are actively trying to stop Greg [Edwards],” Justice Democrats spokesman Waleed Shahid would tell the Washington Post. “Their consultant-driven strategy seems to prefer milquetoast candidates who they believe can appeal to moderate Republicans over progressive candidates of color.”
“This is what systemic racism looks like,” Shahid said.
“Edwards ultimately remained in the race. Nonetheless, Justice Democrats, an insurgent liberal group that has worked to get anti-establishment candidates such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar elected in safe Democratic districts, seized on Persico’s comments, calling them evidence of “systemic racism” among the Democratic Party establishment that didn’t think candidates of color could win,” the Free Beacon reports.
Maloney is the first DCCC chair in a decade to be a white male, adding to suspicions raised by activists the committee is not sufficiently racially or gender diverse.
“Eighteen months ago, House Democrats’ campaign arm was turned upside down and shook up its senior staff mid-election cycle after complaints about a lack of diversity in its top ranks,” POLITICO reports. “At the time, Black and Hispanic lawmakers clashed with the committee for not placing a single person of a color in what they considered positions of authority.”
The infighting comes after the DCCC suffered one of the biggest losses by Democrats in a November election. Despite a record fundraising haul and a successful presidential ticket, not only did House Democrats fail to expand their majority, they lost scores of seats to upstart Republican challengers.
It also comes as Republicans saw increased support from black and Hispanic voters, though still not at the levels seen under Reagan and George W. Bush.
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