Howard Dean’s drive toward party unity will be put to the test this weekend when the Democratic Party meets to hash out one of the most divisive wedges of the primary season.
A 30-member panel of the Democratic National Committee is set to consider the dispute over the discounted Michigan and Florida convention delegates Saturday.
The DNC chairman, who has staked his reputation on a political strategy that involves reaching out to every state to win elections, has said recently he’s committed to seating those delegations — which were stripped because the states held early primaries.
But it’s a sensitive matter, and the meeting’s outcome could make lasting impressions not just on the primary race, but on the Democratic ticket’s potency going into the fall election. Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and party leaders in both states are all attempting to influence the process.
Handled incorrectly, Democratic leaders worry it could be the thread that teases the party loose come November. So they are hopeful Dean, along with the campaigns and panel members, are able to reach a compromise that bridges a party already hurting from a bitter and protracted primary campaign.
“What’s at stake is nothing less than the confidence of Florida voters going into the general election, and the presidency itself,” said Florida Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz.
She faults Dean and DNC leadership for early on criticizing Florida and Michigan in TV interviews and fanning the “flames” of their decision, which she said was over the top.
Party rules automatically allowed for cutting the delegations in half, which is what the Republican Party did. The DNC stripped the entire delegations.
“They just went way overboard and cut off their nose to spite their face,” she said.
But she said Dean has recently moved to reconcile with the states and is hopeful the panel reaches a fair solution.
Battle of the Titans?
At first blush, the weekend meeting is a battle between two rival Democrats.
Clinton, who won both states even though neither candidate campaigned there, has been steadily beating the drum for both delegations to be seated in full. Obama, moving closer to clinching the nomination, has shown a willingness to at least seat some of the delegates, but he wasn’t even on the ballot in Michigan.
“Resolution, resolution,” Obama said Saturday when asked what he wants to come out of the DNC meeting. “I just want them to decide how to approach this in a way in which the Florida and Michigan delegates are seated and they’re happy … I want to be looking at ‘em when I’m standing on stage in Denver in August.”
Clinton spokesman Jay Carson said the campaign is still “fighting for every delegate to be seated.”
He said things are looking “pretty good” and that full seating of the delegations would help most with party unity.
“The campaigns are looking at this strictly in terms of how they might get assistance or how they might be hurt by a potential solution,” said former DNC Chairman Don Fowler. “I think that … Governor Dean should be very actively involved in talking to (both) sides to work out an arrangement.”
But Obama has moved close enough to clinching the nomination that even if he cedes ground on Florida and Michigan, he’s still relatively protected from the possibility of Clinton staging an 11th-hour revolt against his front-running campaign.
Obama is looking more to make a gesture to Florida and Michigan voters, which is what party leaders also are after. They want to put the dispute to rest, and unite against presumptive GOP nominee John McCain.
“I find it unbelievably unfortunate that here we are at the end of May … and we are talking about process instead of John McCain,” DNC Secretary Alice Germond, one of the 30 panel members, told FOXNews.com.
“Hopefully the process part will end on Sunday … We know what’s at stake.”
Clinton has already dredged up in recent days the bitter feelings Democrats harbor toward even the hint of disenfranchisement. In pursuing her delegate argument, Clinton has invited comparisons between the DNC decision and the 2000 election in Florida that cost Democrats the White House.
“You’ll have the disenfranchisement word being tossed around (this weekend),” Germond said.
It will probably be tossed around from both sides. Voters whose primary ballots basically had no impact on the Democratic race can cry foul, but if the DNC turns around to count those primaries in full, voters who stayed home during the Michigan and Florida primaries because they thought they were null and void can also complain.
Germond said the rules have to count for something, and that it’s important to be fair to the 48 states who “abided by the rules.”
“I hope to see this as the beginning of the unity that will be important as we go into the convention and into the general election,” she said. “We’ll probably have to come up with a resolution that probably won’t make anyone 100 percent happy, but will make everyone a little happy … that’s what a compromise is.”
Starting Points
There are two concrete plans before the committee.
The Michigan Democratic Party has proposed giving 69 of its 128 delegates to Clinton and 59 to Obama, a net gain of 10 delegates for Clinton.
“Everybody believes that Michigan and Florida will be seated,” said plan co-author Michigan Rep. Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick. “The division of the delegates is the question.”
A proposal from Florida would halve its 185 delegates. From that, Clinton would get 52.5 and Obama 33.5, a 19-delegate boost for Clinton.
Wasserman Schultz said she wants the Florida delegation seated in full, but at least the latest Florida proposal is based on the primary election results - and not an arbitrary allocation.
The Rules and Bylaws Committee could consider other options on Saturday and will hear the cases of both campaigns.
But the committee could also forward the matter on to a separate committee. Clinton has shown a willingness to fight the Florida-Michigan decision as long as it takes to reach what she feels is an equitable solution.
Dean, however, has given every indication he does not want to see a primary battle last past June.
In an interview with FOX News May 4, he again called on uncommitted superdelegates to make their endorsement by the end of June “so we’ll know who our nominee is” by then.
“It’s tough on the party,” he said of the long process. “But there is also enormous merit to everybody in America getting a chance to vote for these candidates in the primaries.”
Saturday’s meeting will test just how focused and effective Dean can be when it comes to wrapping up the nomination process.
Kilpatrick said this weekend’s meeting has a direct impact on how long the primary lasts.
Neither side is approaching it lightly. The Huffington Post and the Daily Kos blogs posted recent articles about the swarms of protesters from both camps who may descend on the DNC meeting.
But either proposed state plan seems to bode well for Obama.
Even if all the two states’ 313 pledged delegates were allocated, with no votes for Obama from Michigan, Clinton would get 178 to Obama’s 67, closing the gap by 111 votes, according to The Associated Press.
As of Tuesday, Clinton was 198 delegates down from Obama, so that still wouldn’t close his lead.
Obama had 1,978 delegates Tuesday - 48 short of the 2,026 delegates currently needed to seize the nomination. Saturday’s meeting, though, could alter that threshold.
DNC member Debbie Dingell, who helped draft the Michigan delegate proposal, expressed surprise that what began as “a tiny bit of civil disobedience” - an early primary to move influence away from early-voting Iowa and New Hampshire - resulted in such party disarray.
“Nobody predicted it would be like this,” she said.
But she too was hopeful there would be resolution this weekend.
“Our hope is Michigan gets seated and we all start pulling together around a candidate,” she said. “We’ve got to pull together so we win in November.”
FOX News’ Aaron Bruns and Bonney Kapp and The Associated Press contributed to this report. |
