Former Labor Secretary Tom Perez’s weekend victory over Keith Ellison in the race to become DNC chairman shows Democrats learned nothing from their historic shellacking in November and that Barack Obama remains firmly in control of the party.
The win by community organizer and Obama loyalist Perez effectively constitutes a merger of sorts between the Democratic National Committee and Obama’s well-funded Trump-resisting pressure group, Organizing for Action. Perez replaces interim DNC chairman Donna Brazile who herself replaced Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida. The congresswoman was forced out last summer after her role in rigging the nomination process in favor of Hillary Clinton was exposed.
The Perez victory is also a sign that it’s business as usual for the deeply divided party that voters reduced to a regional rump in November and whose leaders think they lost because of bad messaging instead of bad ideas. The DNC, after all, is on record as endorsing the violent, racist Black Lives Matter movement and of accusing American police officers of systematically committing genocide against blacks. These people have learned nothing and are anxious to do the bidding of their unruly radical base that is already determined to impeach President Trump after a little over a month in office.
At the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) outside Washington, D.C., the consensus before the vote among conservatives this writer spoke to seemed to be that Ellison would be the better choice to lead Democrats because he is less palatable to Americans in the heartland who are turned off by his pro-Islamist, racist rhetoric. “Ellison would scare the sh** out of Americans in what the Left calls ‘flyover country,’” one participant said.
Alas, it was not to be.
On Saturday in Atlanta, Perez won the post in the second round of balloting, defeating the Muslim congressman from Minnesota on a vote of 235 to 200. To promote unity in the severely divided party, Perez asked that Ellison be made deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee. DNC members approved the appointment on a voice vote.
After the vote, Perez vowed to rebuild the party at all levels from "school board to the Senate" and reach out to disaffected voters in rural America. "We lead with our values and we lead with our actions," he said, adding the party will concentrate on defending Social Security and Medicare and on "growing good jobs in this economy."
"You know, our unity as a party is our greatest strength. And it's his worst nightmare," he said in a reference to President Trump. "And, frankly, what we need to be looking at is whether this election was rigged by Donald Trump and his buddy Vladimir Putin."
Of course the lie that Trump is Putin’s puppet is central to the Left’s narrative. This is why dirty trickster Ryan Clayton of Americans Take Action Inc. handed out about a thousand small Russian flags emblazoned with “TRUMP” in the middle to the audience at CPAC which met at the Gaylord Hotel in a Maryland suburb of Washington, D.C.
The idea behind this piece of mischievous performance art was to get audience members waving the little Russian flags while the TV cameras were rolling during President Trump’s speech to the assembled conservatives. The Russian flag, like the American, is red, white, and blue and most in the mass gathering of non-vexillologists didn’t realize they were being punked. But someone noticed that the flags were Russian and CPAC staffers promptly collected them from the audience before the prank could fully succeed.
Back in Atlanta, Perez, who was labor secretary and the nation’s top civil rights enforcer under Barack Obama, denounced President Trump.
“Someday they’re going to study this era in American history and they’re gonna study it alongside the Know-Nothing movement,” the new DNC chairman said. “And they’re gonna ask the question of all of us: ‘Where were you in 2017, when we had the worst president in the history of the United States?'”
“And we will all be able to say: The united Democratic Party led the resistance, ensuring that this president was a one-term president and [that we] elected Democrats across this country.”
President Trump sarcastically congratulated Perez.
“Congratulations to Thomas Perez, who has just been named Chairman of the DNC,” he tweeted. “I could not be happier for him, or for the Republican Party!”
Perez responded on Twitter. “Call me Tom,” he wrote. “And don't get too happy. @keithellison and I, and Democrats united across the country, will be your worst nightmare.”
But uniting Democrats will be a tall order. Feelings are still raw among supporters of self-described socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) whom they quite justifiably feel was robbed of the party’s presidential nod by a super-delegate-heavy system stacked against him.
On social media, Democrats let Perez have it and castigated DNC members for voting down a ban on corporate donations to the party.
Rain Duran tweeted, “Yes, I'm sure Trump is shook by the ‘corporate cash first, working class last’ strategy again.”
Celeste Holmes (Twitter handle: @Dallas4Bernie), tweeted that the DNC “just sent a big FU [f*** you] 2 Independents (who # [count] more than registered Dems) & progressives, confirming our #DemExited[.]”
User @GeeOhPees2 tweeted, “No Tom you guys completely blew it. No progressive want [sic] unity with you after this #demexit[.]”
Other leftists expressed their displeasure at Perez’s win. Jim Dean, chairman of Democracy for America, said his election was "incredibly disappointing" and said the "resistance will persist ... with or without the leadership of the Democratic National Committee." Dan Cantor, executive director of the ACORN-founded Working Families Party, said Democrats "missed an opportunity."
The win by community organizer and Obama loyalist Perez effectively constitutes a merger of sorts between the Democratic National Committee and Obama’s well-funded Trump-resisting pressure group, Organizing for Action. Perez replaces interim DNC chairman Donna Brazile who herself replaced Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida. The congresswoman was forced out last summer after her role in rigging the nomination process in favor of Hillary Clinton was exposed.
The Perez victory is also a sign that it’s business as usual for the deeply divided party that voters reduced to a regional rump in November and whose leaders think they lost because of bad messaging instead of bad ideas. The DNC, after all, is on record as endorsing the violent, racist Black Lives Matter movement and of accusing American police officers of systematically committing genocide against blacks. These people have learned nothing and are anxious to do the bidding of their unruly radical base that is already determined to impeach President Trump after a little over a month in office.
At the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) outside Washington, D.C., the consensus before the vote among conservatives this writer spoke to seemed to be that Ellison would be the better choice to lead Democrats because he is less palatable to Americans in the heartland who are turned off by his pro-Islamist, racist rhetoric. “Ellison would scare the sh** out of Americans in what the Left calls ‘flyover country,’” one participant said.
Alas, it was not to be.
On Saturday in Atlanta, Perez won the post in the second round of balloting, defeating the Muslim congressman from Minnesota on a vote of 235 to 200. To promote unity in the severely divided party, Perez asked that Ellison be made deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee. DNC members approved the appointment on a voice vote.
After the vote, Perez vowed to rebuild the party at all levels from "school board to the Senate" and reach out to disaffected voters in rural America. "We lead with our values and we lead with our actions," he said, adding the party will concentrate on defending Social Security and Medicare and on "growing good jobs in this economy."
"You know, our unity as a party is our greatest strength. And it's his worst nightmare," he said in a reference to President Trump. "And, frankly, what we need to be looking at is whether this election was rigged by Donald Trump and his buddy Vladimir Putin."
Of course the lie that Trump is Putin’s puppet is central to the Left’s narrative. This is why dirty trickster Ryan Clayton of Americans Take Action Inc. handed out about a thousand small Russian flags emblazoned with “TRUMP” in the middle to the audience at CPAC which met at the Gaylord Hotel in a Maryland suburb of Washington, D.C.
The idea behind this piece of mischievous performance art was to get audience members waving the little Russian flags while the TV cameras were rolling during President Trump’s speech to the assembled conservatives. The Russian flag, like the American, is red, white, and blue and most in the mass gathering of non-vexillologists didn’t realize they were being punked. But someone noticed that the flags were Russian and CPAC staffers promptly collected them from the audience before the prank could fully succeed.
Back in Atlanta, Perez, who was labor secretary and the nation’s top civil rights enforcer under Barack Obama, denounced President Trump.
“Someday they’re going to study this era in American history and they’re gonna study it alongside the Know-Nothing movement,” the new DNC chairman said. “And they’re gonna ask the question of all of us: ‘Where were you in 2017, when we had the worst president in the history of the United States?'”
“And we will all be able to say: The united Democratic Party led the resistance, ensuring that this president was a one-term president and [that we] elected Democrats across this country.”
President Trump sarcastically congratulated Perez.
“Congratulations to Thomas Perez, who has just been named Chairman of the DNC,” he tweeted. “I could not be happier for him, or for the Republican Party!”
Perez responded on Twitter. “Call me Tom,” he wrote. “And don't get too happy. @keithellison and I, and Democrats united across the country, will be your worst nightmare.”
But uniting Democrats will be a tall order. Feelings are still raw among supporters of self-described socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) whom they quite justifiably feel was robbed of the party’s presidential nod by a super-delegate-heavy system stacked against him.
On social media, Democrats let Perez have it and castigated DNC members for voting down a ban on corporate donations to the party.
Rain Duran tweeted, “Yes, I'm sure Trump is shook by the ‘corporate cash first, working class last’ strategy again.”
Celeste Holmes (Twitter handle: @Dallas4Bernie), tweeted that the DNC “just sent a big FU [f*** you] 2 Independents (who # [count] more than registered Dems) & progressives, confirming our #DemExited[.]”
User @GeeOhPees2 tweeted, “No Tom you guys completely blew it. No progressive want [sic] unity with you after this #demexit[.]”
Other leftists expressed their displeasure at Perez’s win. Jim Dean, chairman of Democracy for America, said his election was "incredibly disappointing" and said the "resistance will persist ... with or without the leadership of the Democratic National Committee." Dan Cantor, executive director of the ACORN-founded Working Families Party, said Democrats "missed an opportunity."