2/12/2017 D.N.C.

Contenders Agree on One Thing: Resistance to Trump - The New York Times

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POLITICS

D.N.C. Contenders Agree on One Thing:

Resistance to Trump
By JONATHAN MARTIN FEB. 11, 2017
BALTIMORE The outpouring of protests across the country has scramb led the contest
for chairman of the Democratic National Committee two weeks before the vote, as party
activists thrash out who should be the face of a newly ener gized party.

The surge of liberal activism in respon se to President T rumps election has

transcended the divisions that some Democrats feared would cleave the party after its
defeat in November . But it has also in jected volatility into a race for party chairman that
had been shaping up as a straightforward proxy war between the candidates most closely
identified with Senator Bernie Sanders of V ermont and Hillary Clinton.

Representative Keith Ellison of Minnesota, one of Mr . Sanderss most prominent

surrogates during last year s primary race, and Thomas E. Perez, the former labor secretary
who backed Mrs. Clinton and received consideration to be her running mate, have emer ged
as the leading contenders. Y et neither has secured the support of anywhere c lose to a
majority of the 447 committee members who will decide the race, as other candidates did
in the weeks leading up to prior votes.

This is partly because other hopefuls in a field that has swelled to double digits have
yet to withdraw from the race. But it also owes to the genuine uncertainty about who can
best harness the antipathy toward Mr . Trump, and lead a party that has been dominated by

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former President Barack Obama, former President Bill Clinton and Mrs. Clinton for more
than two decades.

At the final party-sponsored candidate forum here on Saturday , the leading candidates all
sought to associate themselves with the resistance against Mr . Trump. In an
acknowledgment of how much Democrats are enjoying their T rump-inspired unity and
how much they do not want a replay of the Clinton-Sanders race Mr . Perez and Mr.
Ellison held to a de facto nonaggression pact toward each another .

I had no better friend, Mr . Ellison said of Mr. Perez, referring to the former
secretarys time in the Obama cabinet .

Strikingly, only one candidate among the 10 onstage truly confronted the two front-
runners: Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind.

Why not go with somebody who isn t a product of one faction or another faction, but
somebody who is here to deliver the fresh start our party needs, said Mr . Buttigieg, adding
of the partys contentious presidential primary, I dont know why wed want to live
through it a second time.

He does not have anywhere near the number of public commitments that Mr . Ellison
and Mr. Perez currently enjoy , but Mr. Buttigieg is trying to fashion himself as a
compromise candidate if neither of the front-runners secure a majority on the first ballot
when the party gathers this month in Atlanta.

Anticipating such an ef fort, two of the other trailing contenders used the forum to
target Mr. Buttigieg. The New Hampshire Democratic chairman, Raymond Buckley ,
boasting of his own neutrality during the presidential primary , turned to Mr. Buttigieg at
one point and reminded him of his endorsement of Mrs. Clinton. Sorry , mayor who
supported Hillary, Mr. Buckley quipped. And Jehmu Greene, a Democratic or ganizer and
a former Fox News contributor , chided the 35-year -old Mr. Buttigieg for his frequent
remark that a millennial is best suited to represent millennials.

Before and after the gathering, rumors of deals being struck between competing
camps swirled in the corridors of this city s convention center , where the contenders set up

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booths and one candidate seeking to become the party finance chairman even sprang for a
platter of crab cakes.

While the hopefuls for party chairman have slightly diver gent diagnoses of what went
wrong last year and ideas for the best way forward, the discussion so far has lar gely
centered on party tactics and strategy . Mrs. Clintons victory in the popular vote, Mr .
Trumps unpopularity and the increasingly liberal bent of the party s grass roots have
tempered any calls for moderation.

This is not going to be a philosophical battle, said Representative Steny H. Hoyer of

Maryland, the second-ranking House Democrat. Mr . Hoyer was at Saturday s forum to
support Mr. Perez, but called both his candidate and Mr. Ellison strong progressives.

With support from a number of governors, leading donors and Obama loyalists, Mr .
Perez is clearly the preferred candidate among the Democratic establishment. That status,
despite his liberal credentials, has made him a figure of suspicion among elements of the
Sanders-inspired left.

It says a lot about how much Sanders has skewed how Democrats think when the
Latino labor activist from T akoma Park is considered the centrist, said Kenneth Baer , an
author and a former Obama administration of ficial, alluding to the progressive Maryland
enclave where Mr. Perez lives.

At the outset of the forum here, Mr . Perez proclaimed, I miss Barack Obama a lot,
my friends. Yet he conceded during a television interview that the former p resident had
not paid sufficient attention to party-b uilding.

He also raised eyebrows last week by telling Kansas Democrats that he agreed with
the complaint from Mr . Sanderss supporters that the primary process had b een rigged.
Soon after, Mr. Perez wrote on Twitter that he misspoke and that Mrs. Clinton became
our nominee fair and square.

The machinations have seemed rather small, though, in light of the boiling fury
toward Mr. Trump.

Ben Jealous, the former N.A.A.C.P . president and a supporter of Mr . Ellison, noted
that the Sanders-af filiated progressive group that he helps lead had drawn 500 participants

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to a rally on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, and another 400 to W estern Maryland, both
conservative parts of the state.

Donald Trump will ensure we stay woke, Mr . Jealous said.

Get politics and Washington news updates via Facebook, Twitter and in the Morning Briefing
newsletter.

A version of this article appears in print on February 12, 2017, on Page A15 of the
New York edition with the
headline: D.N.C. Contenders, Looking to Salve the W ounds From 2016, Line Up Against Trump.

2017 The New York Times Company

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