MoveOn.org and other liberal groups have started a fierce attack against Sen. Chuck Schumer’s position as the Senate Democratic leader-in-waiting after he came out strongly against the Iran nuclear deal Thursday night.
The liberal activist group, which raises millions of dollars for Democratic candidates and boasts more than 8 million members across the country, initiated a donor strike against Schumer Friday, just hours after he announced he would vote with most Republicans against the Iran deal when Congress returns in September.
“While not unexpected, it is outrageous and unacceptable that the Democrat who wants to be the party’s leader in the Senate is siding with the Republican partisans and neoconservative ideologues who are trying to scrap this agreement and put us on the path to war,” said MoveOn.org Political Action Executive Director Ilya Sheyman.
“Our country doesn’t need another Joe Lieberman in the Senate, and it certainly doesn’t need him as Democratic leader,” she added. “… No real Democratic leader does this. If this is what counts as ‘leadership’ among Democrats in the Senate, Senate Democrats should be prepared to find a new leader … this is not what the volunteers, activists, small-dollar donors and voters who actually win elections spend their time and money to support.”
Schumer is expected to take over as the Democrats’ Senate leader when Minority Leader Harry Reid retires after the 2016 elections.
The comments came after several former Obama administration aides slammed Schumer on Twitter Thursday night after word of his opposition to the Iran deal leaked to the Huffington Post.
Former White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer retweeted a MoveOn statement saying Senate Democrats should be prepared to find a new leader and added his own harsh comments.
“The base won’t support a leader who thought Obamacare was a mistake and wants war with Iran,” he tweeted.
In late November, Schumer chided his own party for pushing the Affordable Care Act through Congress in 2010.
In a speech to the National Press Club, Schumer stressed that he supports the president’s signature healthcare law but says Democrats were wrong to push it through using their new mandate after the 2008 elections rather than focusing on the economy at the height of the recession.
Jon Favreau, the former director of White House speechwriting, was equally harsh.
“Chuck Schumer, who said it was a mistake to pass Obamacare, now comes out again [sic] the Iran Deal. This is our next Senate leader,” he tweeted.
Just minutes later, Favreau retweeted a comment from a former Obama spokesman.
“Timely endorsement of the foreign policy of the GOP candidates on stage from Chuck Schumer,” Ben LaBolt remarked.
Favreau then appeared to throw his support to Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., who lost out to Schumer in the informal contest to become Reid’s successor.
“This is a Democratic leader: Dick Durbin Becomes Lead Whip For Peace on Iran,” he tweeted with a link to a Huffington Post piece about Durbin’s role in whipping support for the Iran deal in the Senate.
Other liberal groups piled on. CREDO, a San Francisco activist organization, blasted Schumer, saying it’s time to change his nickname among critics on the left from “Wall Street Chuck” to “Warmonger Chuck” and reminding liberal voters that he voted in favor of going to war in Iraq.
“Chuck Schumer was wrong on Iraq and he is wrong on Iran,” said the group’s political director, Becky Bond. “Schumer’s decision to join Republicans in attempting to sabotage the Iran nuclear deal once again shows that he is unfit to lead Senate Democrats.”
After Reid announced his retirement and it became clear that Schumer would become the next Democratic Senate leader, she said more than 100,000 CREDO activists signed a petition saying that Schumer was the wrong choice.
