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Patrick Martin Correspondent
The annual meeting of the Democratic National Committee, held in Las Vegas on October 18-21, showed that party operatives are preparing for the 2018 election year with a distinct shift to the right in personnel, policy and candidates. DNC chairman Tom Perez, installed by the Clinton wing of the party establishment in a narrow victory over representative Keith Ellison, a Sanders supporter, nominated a slate of candidates for top party committees that excluded several long time activists who backed Sanders against Clinton in the campaign for the 2016 presidential nomination.

Among those removed from the executive committee were James Zogby, the highest-ranking Arab-American on the DNC; New Hampshire state party chairman Ray Buckley; long time DNC secretary Alice Germond and Barbra Casbar Siperstein, the first transgendered member of the DNC. All either supported Sanders against Clinton, or Ellison against Perez, or both. Initial Press reports highlighted the protests by the former Sanders supporters, portraying the shake-up in the DNC committees, particularly the executive committee and the rules committee, as a “purge” of “dissenters,” although the actual policy differences involved are minimal.

Buckley told NBC News, “I understand the chair can do as he pleases, but still, it’s all just very disappointing.” Zogby tweeted, “this doesn’t bring the party together. It deepens the divide at a time we need all hands on deck for ‘18 & ‘20.” There was also criticism of Perez for including former chair Donna Brazile on his slate of 75 at-large members for the DNC, given her role in 2016 when she gave Clinton a preview of questions before candidate events held on CNN. Her role was made public when WikiLeaks published Brazile’s contemporaneous emails. Another Perez selection was Manny Ortiz, a lobbyist for the huge Wall Street bank Citigroup. The rules committee is particularly sensitive, since it will be charged with implementing the recommendations of a special Unity Reform Commission created by Clinton and Sanders as part of his agreement to endorse the Wall Street favourite after she corralled the majority of Democratic convention delegates.

The commission is drawing up recommendations on changes in state rules for delegate selection, including the role of so-called “super-delegates,” elected officials and DNC members who are given votes at the convention in addition to those delegates elected in primaries and caucuses. Virtually all super-delegates, the personification of the party establishment, backed Clinton. While the Unity Reform Commission was balanced between Clinton and Sanders supporters, the rules committee that will receive its report and take action is stacked 5-0 in favour of former Clinton supporters, following the removal of Buckley.

Perez denied that there was any effort to remove former Sanders supporters or punish them. A spokesman used identity politics to justify the changes in composition, claiming that the Perez slate of committee members and at-large nominees “reflects the unprecedented diversity of our party’s coalition” by increasing the number of Native American, gay and Puerto Rican members, as well as trade union officials.

Jane Kleeb, chair of the Nebraska Democratic Party and a Sanders supporter, criticised the diversity claims, telling Huffington Post, “It’s not only misdirection, but it’s also divisive.” She added, “It continues to paint the Bernie people as not caring about our native and Latino and black brothers and sisters, which is complete nonsense.” At one point on Friday, Karen Carter Peterson, DNC vice chair of civic engagement and voter participation, accused Sanders and Ellison supporters of seeking to remove black women from party leadership, citing, among others, Donna Brazile. In another demonstration of the right-wing character of the party leadership, Perez named as a deputy finance chair of the DNC Dan Halpern, a former chairman of the Georgia Restaurant Association and past board member of the National Restaurant Association.