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**DECEMBER 6, 2024**

The American Prospect was founded at a time of turmoil and doubt for the progressive movement. We were built for this moment, and now we need you more than ever to support us so we're stronger than ever in 2025. This December, we have a goal to raise $75,000 to support our ambitious reporting projects in the upcoming year. We plan to do what we do best-follow the money, expose corruption, and hold the rich and powerful to account. But we can't do it without you. Please consider making a donation today [link removed] to power our newsroom-we can't afford to slow down now.

Kuttner on TAP

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**** The Face of the Democratic Party

The next DNC chair will have a higher profile than usual. The two leading candidates, Ken Martin of Minnesota and Ben Wikler of Wisconsin, are both terrific.

It's hard to think of a time when the Democratic Party was more bereft of real leaders. As the losing presidential candidate, Kamala Harris is not held in warm regard, and her continuing fundraising efforts have added to the irritation. Joe Biden, who accomplished more than his critics give him credit for, is going out on a low note.

Usually, the chair of the Democratic National Committee is a technocrat and not the face of the party. But this time could be different.

A number of names have been mentioned in the press coverage and in self-promotion, but it's clear that the two finalists will be Ken Martin, 51, Minnesota party chair, and his neighbor, Ben Wikler, 43, who chairs the Wisconsin state party. Both are excellent party-builders, both are substantive progressives, and both have earned wide respect. The election is set for February 1.

Martin, the chair of the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party, began as a campaign worker for Paul Wellstone. Under Martin's leadership, Minnesota Democrats won 22 statewide elections in a row, flipping Minnesota from a state that often elected Republican governors and all-Republican legislatures to a normally blue one. Gov. Tim Walz's impressive legislative achievements [link removed] were built on a strong grassroots state party. Martin is also a first-rate fundraiser. Under his leadership, the state party has a budget for county parties and pays half the cost of local organizers. "We need to contest every race," he told me, "even races that we know we are not going to win."

In a recently circulated memo to members of the DNC, he called for party-building in every state, rejected the model of the DNC as an adjunct of the White House, and declared bluntly, "The majority of Americans now believe the Republican Party best represents the interests of the working class and the poor, and the Democratic Party is the party of the wealthy and the elites. It's a damning indictment on our party brand."

Ben Wikler has a similar philosophy and can claim parallel achievements in Wisconsin. In 2022, Gov. Tony Evers won a second term, the first time a Democratic governor was re-elected since the JFK era. Voters flipped the state Supreme Court to majority-Democratic, setting up gerrymandering reform and the potential overturning of Act 10 [link removed], Scott Walker's anti-union law. Harris actually got 37,000 more votes in Wisconsin than Biden did in 2020. Turnout rose 1.3 percent, highest in the nation. Tammy Baldwin was re-elected in a state carried by Trump. And Democrats broke the Republican legislative supermajority, flipping ten State Assembly seats, and four Senate seats. This was built both on grassroots party-building at the county level, and on prodigious (and somewhat controversial) fundraising, of which more in a moment.

What's the difference between the two men? Both are great party-builders. Martin, because of his long years of work with other state parties, has closer relationships with the membership of the DNC. Wikler has more of a public persona. And each has taken pains not to bad-mouth the other.

As president of the Association of State Democratic Committees, Martin has already lined up endorsements of at least 100 voting members of the DNC out of about 450. Because of this head start, Martin has been considered the front-runner.

But since declaring his candidacy last Sunday, Wikler has sought to create a bandwagon psychology, by lining up endorsements by prominent Democrats. So far, these include a spate of flattering press mentions and explicit endorsements by Rahna Epting of MoveOn, Adam Green of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, our colleague Robert Reich, as well as Jonathan Cowan of Third Way.

[link removed]

Third Way, heavily financed by Wall Street, calls itself center-left, but because of its past policy positions (cut Social Security [link removed]) and efforts at a feeble bipartisanship, it is better described as center-right. Third Way has no real base in the Democratic Party.

Politico even gave Cowan op-ed space [link removed] to write an effusive piece that begins, "At Third Way, we represent the center-left of the party. But we agree with former Progressive Caucus Co-Chair Mark Pocan and others on the far left [

**sic**] that the person best equipped to lead the Democratic National Committee in this uncertain and high-stakes moment is Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler."

Far left? What's Cowan up to? Perhaps he wants to back a possible winner, but this is also about money, of which Third Way can channel plenty. Wikler has been criticized in some quarters for taking dark money from the likes of Reid Hoffman, who gave the Wisconsin party $9 million since 2020 [link removed]. Hoffman was also a big backer of Kamala Harris, whom he urged to fire FTC Chair Lina Khan. Such are the perils of taking money from corporate Democrats.

A source close to Wikler defends the coziness with Third Way, which doesn't represent Wikler's own politics, as showing that he's seeking to build a "big tent" party.

But even critics, who wish Wikler were more circumspect about whom he raises money from, respect him as a great state party chair. And in fairness, money remains an ongoing dilemma for Democrats.

Quite apart from who ends up being elected the next party chair at February's meeting, there will be a vote on a resolution proposed by Larry Cohen, Bernie Sanders's top lieutenant on the DNC, calling for a ban on corporate dark money in party primaries.

Others who have been either self-promoting, or who have been mentioned in the press as possible candidates for DNC chair, have little chance against Martin and Wikler. Former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley, a declared candidate, has little if any base in the broader DNC. Rahm Emanuel, also mentioned in press accounts, is an even more far-fetched possibilty.

Happily, there is no way for Wikler and Martin, as two progressives, to crowd each other out, as happened with Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren in the 2020 presidential priimaries, since the DNC rules provide for a runoff between the top two.

One other party leadership post is open, and here the news is terrible. Michigan Sen. Gary Peters is stepping down as chair of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC), the fundraising arm of the Senate Democratic caucus. The only declared candidate for the job is New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand.

Gillibrand, in contrast to Martin and Wikler, represents all that is corrupt and opportunistic in the Democratic Party. She is very close to the crypto industry, which dumped scads of dark money into late campaign ads to defeat progressives such as Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio. Gillibrand also is widely loathed for leading the campaign to hound Sen. Al Franken out of office on charges of sexual harassment. Gillibrand will get the job mainly because nobody else wants it.

Since the DNC and the DSCC work in close concert, expects sparks to fly whether the new DNC chair is Martin or Wikler. One possibility, still premature, is that one could be chair and the other executive director. If ever there were a moment for both a strong Democratic Party and a compelling face of the party, it's now.

~ ROBERT KUTTNER

Follow Robert Kuttner on Twitter [link removed]

On the Prospect website

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An open letter to Joe Biden BY FRANCESCA FIORENTINI

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