Despite being led by a person of color in Tom Perez, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) isn’t really doing much to advance policies that are beneficial to Black Democrats.
According to BuzzFeed News, black-led political action committees are going around the DNC to carve their own policy and advocacy agenda as a part of the rebuilding process from the 2016 election, which was nothing short of disastrous for Democrats. In the eyes of several black leaders, the DNC simply hasn’t done enough.
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“It’s like we’re in a bad relationship,” Jessica Pierce, the national co-chair of Black Youth Project 100, said. “They say, ‘Hey, we hear you, we’re going to change.’ Then they do worse. I think this moment is us finally saying, ‘This is not working for us.'”
Operatives are trying to replicate models used by successful left-wing groups like EMILY’s List, Planned Parenthood Action Fund, and NARAL by mobilizing to support and put black candidates in office, organizing black donors, and creating more leverage inside the party.
“There’s always been this longing for more support,” said Quentin James, who founded Collective PAC, which has heavily supported Bernie Sanders. “[The DNC’s] objective is not to elect black people to office. It’s to elect Democrats. We have to build independent power outside of any party that prioritizes our values and issues as a community, and to do that I think you have to consider that the DNC is not the sole vehicle to create that pathway and progress.”
Perez seems determined to not let the party fracture much longer, hoping that millennials and people of color will not only join the table, but actually speak up.
“For too long, the Democratic Party has told young people of color to take a seat at the table, sit down and shut up. That ends now,” Perez wrote in an email to BuzzFeed News. “We need to weave their ideas, their energy, and their leadership into everything we do as a party. We talk a lot about millennials and people of color being the future of our party, but frankly that future is now. […] Our job is to turn that energy into electoral success.”
For many African Americans it seems, the Republican Party is beyond reproach and the Democratic Party is still worth saving. While political insularity was one of the key factors that drove Donald Trump to defeat Hillary Clinton and allowed the GOP to retain the House and Senate, Democrats are doubling down.
Unless the Democrats come up with a platform and message that resonates not just with people of color but the white working class, they’ll continue to catch more Ls in 2018 and 2020.
