Democrats: “Not Relatable Anymore”?

Who will be their next leader?

Almost immediately following Vice President Kamala Harris’ loss in the 2024 election, Democrats began soul-searching. From every corner of the political spectrum, newspapers tried to diagnose what was wrong with their ill patient, the Democratic Party.

There were plenty of opinions on what went wrong. The Atlantic pointed to immigration as the problem. The New Republic said Democrats have abandoned the working class. CNN said Harris should’ve tried to break from President Joe Biden. The National Review pinned it on Trump being more joyous than Harris. But one theme carried over in almost every article: the Democrats need to make a change.

And now, the Democratic Party has a chance to do that by electing a new chair to the Democratic National Committee. Their hope is that this person will help them find not just a new identity, but also a winning message.

While the DNC chair isn’t usually the face of the party—that’s typically reserved for elected officials or the president—all eyes are on this race. After the Dems lost big in November, current chair Jamie Harrison announced he was stepping down. Four serious contenders are vying to replace him, with others hinting they might enter the race too.

The main role of the chair is to develop a strategy, fundraise for the party, keep everyone on the same message, and pick and choose campaign battles for the DNC to get involved in. After losing control of the White House and the Senate and reckoning with the fact that Republicans will maintain power in the House of Representatives, the incoming chair is going to have to be laser focused on winning electoral victories.

So how does the DNC even choose a chair? It’s not exactly a job you see advertised on LinkedIn.

They’re elected by members of the DNC Executive Committee. In order to win the role, candidates must first get forty signatures from committee members by January 25th to make it onto the ballot. Once that happens, they begin campaigning, trying to win over as many members of the committee as possible. Their strategy could include everything from one-on-one conversations to appeals on late night TV.

This year, candidates will have the chance to talk to members directly at four forums set for January, with the final election set for February 1. The chair is elected by a simple majority.

So, who is in the running?

Hailing from Minneapolis, MN, coming in at thirteen years as chair of the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party, right-hand man to Governor Tim Walz, is Ken Martin. Martin is a powerhouse in Midwestern Democratic politics, serving as the longest-running chair of the Minnesota DFL.

(Fun fact: Minnesota still uses the term “DFL” or “Democratic Farmer-Labor Party.” The DFL was formed back in the 1940s when Minnesota’s popular Farmer-Labor party united with the Democratic Party. The party represents a coalition of the state’s farmers, union workers, and Democrats which historically had some similar goals.)

When Martin inherited the Minnesota DFL in 2011, the party was $725,000 in debt, and Democrats had just lost big in the 2010 midterms. But under Martin’s leadership, the Democrats won back the state legislature and a key Congressional seat in 2012.

Martin also set things straight financially. In the final stretches of the election this year, the Minnesota DFL said they had raised nearly $17 million this cycle and had $6.5 million left to spend, with zero debt.

He’s centered his candidacy for DNC chair around “working people,” telling The New York Times in a November interview that “people were feeling a lot of economic anxiety” and ultimately they “were going to vote against the party in power.”

He also stressed the need for Democrats to run a “perpetual campaign,” saying that, “The day after the election is the first day of the next election. There’s no time to rest.”

Martin is considered a front-runner for the job.

But there’s another Martin in the race: Martin O’Malley, the former governor of Maryland, who just resigned as commissioner of the Social Security Administration to seek the DNC job.

O’Malley had presidential aspirations at one point. O’Malley campaigned heavily for Hillary Clinton in 2008, but then decided to run against her in the Democratic primary in 2016. It was a surprise, considering most Democrats sat that race out, seeing Clinton as the clear front-runner. O’Malley didn’t get any traction and dropped out after a few months.

But now, after a brief stint in the Biden administration as the commissioner of the Social Security Administration, O’Malley wants back into Democratic politics. He says his vision for the future of the party can lead it “out of this darkness and into a better future where we do a better job of connecting with the American people around the economic reality.”

Like Ken Martin, Martin O’Malley is focusing on the economy. At a candidate forum, he said, “I may sound like a broken record, but I really do believe it is the economic issues. It is the union jobs, living wages, opportunity for all… Too many people heard ‘defending America, defending democracy,’ and they thought this meant defending the status quo.”

The third candidate for DNC chair is Ben Wikler. While he hasn’t attracted as many endorsements as Ken Martin, he’s gained a considerable amount of media attention.

Wikler has been a lifelong activist. He co-founded the Student Global AIDS Campaign while at Harvard, and even went on to speak in front of the United Nations on behalf of the organization.

The Wisconsinite then worked on Al Franken’s radio show, The Al Franken Show, and helped the former SNL star write two books. In 2014, he became the director of MoveOn.org, a progressive political action committee.

After raising millions and leading a campaign to block the repeal of Obamacare in 2017, Wikler went back home to lead the Wisconsin Democratic Party. Wikler has delivered wins for the party there, helping flip the state Supreme Court. Wikler also helped defend Sen. Tammy Baldwin’s and Gov. Tony Evers’ seats.

Wikler has mounted a full campaign for the role, including a website and media blitz (like an appearance on Daily Show with Jon Stewart), pushing his slogan, “Unite, fight, win.”

“To me, uniting means a reckoning with how we can adapt to do better,” Wikler told the audience at a candidate forum, “but not recriminations about different things in the past.”

Wikler, like the others, suggested Democrats didn’t connect with voters in 2024, saying “a ton of working-class folks… didn’t hear our message.”

Wikler, O’Malley, and Martin have similar ideas and seem to be banking on their differences in personality, experience, and leadership styles to get them the job. But a fourth candidate, James Skoufis, is trying to set himself apart.

At 37, Skoufis is the youngest candidate, and doesn’t have the national profile that his opponents do. He’s been serving in the NY State Legislature for twelve years, and outperformed Harris in his district by 20 points in November.

Skoufis told The New York Times that he thinks “the average voter looks at the Democratic Party and some Democratic candidates and thinks that we’re running for university chancellor instead of public office based on some of the language that we use.”

“We are concerned about being overly politically correct,” Skoufis told Spectrum News NY. “We’re not relatable anymore.”

Others are rumored to be considering a run, including Ambassador to Japan and former mayor of Chicago Rahm Emanuel, New York Assembly Member Michael Blake, outgoing Senator Sherrod Brown, 2020 Bernie Sanders Campaign Director Faiz Shakir, and Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow.

The new chair will be tested quickly, as there will likely be three vacancies in the House to fill early next year. Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz resigned last month, his colleague Rep. Mike Waltz was tapped by President-Elect Donald Trump to be his National Security Advisor, and New York Rep. Elise Stefanik was nominated by him to be Ambassador to the United Nations. Even though those races are in red districts, it could be an opportunity for the incoming DNC chair to debut their new strategies and messaging.

Ultimately, who the DNC chooses as their next leader will convey a lot about the direction they think the party needs to head in. Will their new message be focused on the economy? Will they dial back the “political correctness,” as James Skoufis suggests they should, or will they focus more on working class Americans? We’ll have those answers soon enough.