This action from the DNC to withhold the public viewing regarding its own autopsy report on the last presidential race seems remarkable yet entirely predictable. Resistant to unpleasant candor, the party's leadership apparatus behaves closer to a PR firm rather than an electoral entity focused on building a volunteer base to secure victories.
A Culture of Conformity
Unwilling to depart from the prevailing attitude demanding unity, the committee has stayed under that legacy all through this past year. Making public the findings might have shown that the leadership actually want to foster honest conversation about the missteps that enabled Donald Trump to become president again. However, the DNC is proceeding under the pretense that there are no lessons to be learned from the electoral catastrophe from the last cycle.
Our guiding principle: does this help us win? If the answer is no, it’s a distraction from our fundamental goal," an explanation reportedly given to justify concealing the analysis.
Critical Problems an Analysis Might Have Examined
A genuine analysis worth its salt would tackle head-on key points of failure. Among them are:
- Electoral Alienation: Failing to retain of millions of voters that backed the party's candidate in 2020 was decisive in the close recent race.
- The Choice to Run: The stubborn insistence of a party leader to run again, coupled with an extremely delayed exit, is seen by some as robbing the party's base the chance for a genuine choice.
- Losing Touch With Core Democratic Voters: During a time of inflation, the campaign allegedly ceding to corporate donors' interests while failing to challenge the impact of big business.
- The Foreign Policy Impact: The failure to shift a stance on a ongoing war is cited as alienating key demographic groups, particularly among young people, Arab-Americans, and Muslim Americans.
- A Decline in Youth Allegiance: Extensive evidence demonstrates a huge decrease of votes for the candidate from the youth electorate.
A History of Evasion
This refusal fits a recurring tendency of sidestepping hard truths. It echoes an episode where nearly all elected Democrat in Washington acquiesced to a sitting president's insistence on seeking another term until a catastrophic campaign event forced an exit.
At the same time, large majorities of the electorate had been continually telling surveyors that they did not want that candidate to seek re-election.
Financial Questions
A substantive autopsy might also investigate issues regarding where money went, such as the amounts were directed to high-priced advisors as well as ad buyers over the course of a campaign which expended an enormous war chest during the general election.
The Broader Problem
Fundamentally, the secrecy of the official autopsy highlights an allegiance to the existing power structure that oversaw a losing presidential campaign. The message for ordinary supporters – which includes countless loyal volunteers – appears to be that they do not be trusted to know what party chiefs say they discovered based on an analysis based on extensive interviews.
An organization incapable to honestly assess where it went wrong will struggle to climb out of the pattern that proved so beneficial to the rival party.
