Davis: DNC to rebuild party
Rome City Commissioner Wendy Davis is one of nine Georgians with a vote in the Democratic National Committee election.
The 447 members of the Democratic National Committee are gathering in Atlanta for three days this week to elect the party chairman — and Rome City Commissioner Wendy Davis is one of nine Georgians who have a vote.
There are at least nine candidates running and Davis said Tuesday she’s confident the top five or six are up to the job.
“They’re all saying very similar things: We’ve made mistakes as a party; the party needs to rebuild all the way down to the grassroots,” she said. “We know we just got our butts kicked. Now the question is, who do we want to represent us.”
The two strongest candidates appear to be former Labor Secretary Tom Perez and Congressman Keith Ellison of Minnesota. But some of the candidates with lesser name-recognition have made their marks by building their state parties, Davis said, and that also fits the DNC’s new focus.
“People say we need to get away from ‘the establishment,’ but then they want to decide what ‘establishment’ is,” she pointed out.
Both Ellison, who’s considered the Bernie Sanders candidate, and Perez, who’s linked to Hillary Clinton, have solid histories in Washington, D.C.
“There’s an idea that we’re just refighting the primary, but I can tell you that 97 percent of the people voting Saturday are not interested in doing that,” Davis said. “I think they both bring something to the table. Secretary Perez has a history of going into places and turning them around … Congressman Ellison is (positioned as) the new voice.”
Davis — who was keeping her preference under wraps Wednesday — said the DNC needs to elect a representative who can manage a 50-state bureaucracy, raise money and be a compelling “face of the party” on television.
While the official meetings don’t start until today, Davis went down to Atlanta Wednesday. She’s lobbying the arriving leaders for more support of the Democratic Municipal Officials subgroup, which wants to ramp up its mobilization efforts.
“We’re a little committee, but we’re making the pitch that the national party needs to look all the way down to the cities and counties,” she said.
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