Two weeks after suffering another stinging defeat to Donald Trump, Democrats are in the throes of dissecting what went wrong and figuring out their path forward.
And the first concrete step in beginning their next chapter is already underway: selecting a new chair of the national party committee.
The post will take on outsize importance for a defeated party lacking a clear leader, especially in the run-up to the 2028 presidential election, when the new chair will have to oversee the party’s primary and its controversial new calendar imposed by President Joe Biden.
Was this email forwarded to you? Sign up here to receive it weekdays.
Over the past 48 hours, a bevy of contenders interested in succeeding Jaime Harrison as the chair of the Democratic National Committee have either officially jumped into the race or seen their names floated as options.
It started Monday, when former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, a onetime presidential candidate and the commissioner of the Social Security Administration, kicked off the race by entering the fray. Minnesota Democratic Party Chair Ken Martin, a DNC vice chair and leader of the Association of State Democratic Committees, followed by formally announcing his candidacy Tuesday.
Both Martin and O’Malley stressed ongoing investments in state parties as key to their vision for moving the DNC forward.
Also on Tuesday, Latino Democratic strategist Chuck Rocha confirmed on X that he was in the running. So far, the only woman to emerge as a possible candidate, as Politico reported,is Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow. She drew national acclaim on the left in 2022 after she delivered a speech in defiance of a Republican who cast her as a “groomer” in a fundraising appeal, which led to a speaking slot at this summer’s Democratic National Convention.
Still looming out there: Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler, who has developed a reputation as a prodigious fundraiser and field organizer.
“Ben is seriously considering a run,” a person with knowledge of Wikler’s thinking told NBC News on Monday.
That’s on top of chatter around Rahm Emanuel, the U.S. ambassador to Japan, former Chicago mayor and chief of staff tothen-President Barack Obama. Emanuel has reached out to other DNC members to test the waters, according to two people close to him.
The DNC vice chair position is also drawing attention. Adam Parkhomenko, a Democratic operative who worked on Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaigns, is considering a bid for the post, for which he unsuccessfully ran in 2017.
“I am seriously considering stepping back into the race, and I promise to take the time to weigh this decision carefully, with the same dedication to our party and values that I’ve always carried,” Parkhomenko said in a message to supporters obtained by NBC News.
Also eyeing a run for the vice chair position is James Zogby, the founder of the Arab American Institute and longtime former DNC member who has criticized the party from the left.
While it’s still too early to get a clear sense of the fault lines that will define the DNC leadership races, the 50-state strategy could be one. This is a vision — investing in red, blue and swing states alike — that Martin in particular has fully embraced. If Emanuel does get into the race, it's a strategy he famously opposed, even getting into a public feud with Howard Dean over it, arguing the party should train its focus on battleground states.
The race could also expose divisions between an old era, one that embraced Obama — who had drastically diminished the role of the DNC and state parties by setting up a parallel entity in Organizing for America — and new faces who would bring fresh ideas to a party in search of a way forward.
