DNC to Consider Unity Reform Commission Recommendations. Locally, RCV Works (slowly) & Webber Wins

By paulgibson51 on March 7, 2018 • ( 0 )

RCV took awhile, but the candidate who led substantially in the first round, sustained and built that lead through subsequent counts…details on this and the DNC’s looming decision on Party reform which, If passed, would address some of recent concerns with DCCC.

After one round Alan Webber lead by a wide margin with 39% of the vote with Trujillo (24%) and Noble (22.5%) trailing significantly. While it took until Ives, Maestas and then Noble were eliminated for Webber to achieve a majority, the majority was a solid 66%-34%. What does it mean?

It took a bit longer than expected to get to the results, with City spokesperson, Matt Ross, pointing to difficulties closing out voting operations and the City Clerk blaming the RCV process itself;
Whatever the cause, in what many felt was going to be a deeply divided race, a clear winner emerged and a costly and time consuming traditional runoff has been avoided, a runoff;
If RCV accurately captured the sentiments of voters if their candidate was not on the ballot, it would appear that a runoff would have resulted in a strong Webber win, a result achieved with RCV;
Let the work begin, but before you do, how about clicking the donate button and make a contribution. We are ever so close to being out of the hole….thanks to lots of you.

Retake Our Democracy’s Local Action Team will be meeting very soon to discuss and prioritize the policies identified in our Mayoral and City Council Voters Guide and we will be meeting with the new Mayor, as well. Retake is very hopeful that we will be able to forge a more cohesive relationship with this Council and Mayor, with more negotiation and less strident advocacy that recently has pitted Retake in opposition to City positions (RCV, PNM Solarization, Protecting Campaign Disclosure Law). Let’s get started!, To review our platform (which informed the Mayor and City Council Surveys, click here.

In other races, Councilor Lindell easily won re-election, Carol Romero Wirth won in District II without going to ranked choice voting by garnering 53% of the vote, and Joanne Vigil Coppler won in District IV. To read more from the New Mexican on the City Council race Click here.

DNC to Vote on Unity Commission’s Reform Plan for Democratic Party

This should be easy. After a divisive 2016 primary season and what is looking like another battle on an uneven playing field between progressives and centrist party leaders, a Unity Commission has UNANIMOUSLY recommended passage of a set of small d-democratic Party reforms that would:

Reduce the number of superdelegates by 60%;
Force DNC members to vote for the candidate who won the primary or caucus in their state;
Create greater transparency in how donations are used; and
Generally open up the Party.

However, as reported in Common Dreams: “Insider inertia can suffocate change. The party’s pros may well not realize how explosive – and destructive –it would be to block what are relatively moderate reforms. Roused by Sanders, an entire new generation is pushing at the party’s gates. Enraged by Trump and the Republican Congress, citizen movements – Black Lives Matter, #MeToo, the Dreamers, the Fight for $15, March for Our Lives and more – are bringing new energy and people into electoral politics. Unprecedented numbers of fresh candidates are challenging incumbents up and down the ballot.”

But this new energy has not been welcomed with open arms. Indeed, as reported in six posts over the past six months, the DCCC has been tilting the scales aggressively in the primary process, undermining progressive candidates with grassroots support in preference for more centrist candidates supported by corporate interests, or themselves coming from the corporate sector. What Party leadership fears is that contentious primary battles between progressives and centrists will weaken the Party and result in some left-leaning candidates who can win a majority of Democratic votes in the primary, but not do so in the general against the GOP. That is the heart of the dispute between DCCC and progressive, grassroots groups throughout the nation.

Progressives claim that the old system is too much about inside the beltway influence and if not reformed will result in centrist candidates that do not motivate new, young and energized progressives. From Common Dreams: “If the DNC votes against reform – or the state parties torpedo it – it will feed cynicism about the rigged system and turn activists toward third parties, or away from electoral politics altogether.”

Much has been made about the DCCC’s support for a centrist, very corporate candidate in Houston. Common Dreams describes the DCCC candidate and her opponent this way: “The DCCC’s preferred candidate in this race is a corporate lawyer, whose firm recently won a multi-million lawsuit against the SEIU Justice for Janitors campaign. The DCCC chose the deep-pocket candidate. [The progressive candidate] Moser also apparently angered the DCCC by employing her husband’s firm – Revolution Messaging (which worked with Sanders in the presidential primary) – rather than one of the designated DCCC consultants.” As reported here, Moser has made sarcastic remarks in the past about Texas that DCCC spokespeople claim will be very damaging in the general election. And while they may have a point here, as described in multiple posts recently, there are dozens of primary races where the DCCC is consistently backing the centrist candidate with corporate backing over grassroots candidates with more progressive leanings. Click here to read the most damaging of these posts, as it covers many, many races.

Outrage at this attack immediately went viral, and has sparked a flood of donations to Moser. It has also generated calls for progressives to direct their donations to Our Revolution or Justice Democrats and to stop donating to the DCCC. Click here to read the full Common Dreams report.

Please contact our DNC members listed below and tell them that you want the entire Unity Commission recommendations adopted without revision.

Richard Ellenberg
State Chair
richard@nmdemocrats.org
Neomi Martinez-Parra
Vice-Chair
neomi@nmdemocrats.org
Joni Marie Gutierrez
New Mexico DNC Committeewoman
575-526-5079 | jonig@zianet.com
Raymond Sanchez
New Mexico DNC Committeeman
rgsanchez@smdlegal.com