Nancy Pelosi has been putting faux Democrats with a history of recruiting other faux Democrats since she has led the party in the House of Representatives.<\/p>\n
I thought that she had truly scraped the bottom of the barrel with Steve Israel, who she literally praised as reptilian<\/a>, but she has truly screwed the pooch with Cheri Bustos<\/a>:<\/p>\n The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is in full-blown turmoil. <\/p>\n Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairwoman Cheri Bustos (D-Ill.) was set to make an unplanned trip to Washington from her district Monday amid an outcry from top black and Latino lawmakers over a lack of diversity in the campaign arm’s senior management ranks. <\/p>\n \u2026\u2026\u2026 <\/p>\n POLITICO reported<\/a> last week that black and Hispanic lawmakers are furious with Bustos\u2019 stewardship of the campaign arm. They say the upper echelon of the DCCC is bereft of diversity, and it is not doing enough to reach Latino voters and hire consultants of color. In addition, several of Bustos\u2019 senior aides have left in the first six months of her tenure, including her chief of staff \u2014 a black woman \u2014 and her director of mail and polling director, both women. <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n I would note that the complaint here is that the consultants of color aren’t getting the patronage jobs that they deserve.<\/p>\n In response to the outcry, Bustos has agreed to participate in diversity and inclusion training for DCCC employees. An August training had previously been scheduled for just staff. <\/p>\n \u201cChairwoman Bustos is coming back because she understands how important it is for her to hear from staff directly and to reassure them that we have a strong commitment to diversity and inclusion at every level,\u201d said DCCC spokesman Jared Smith. <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n This is exactly what she said in response to the outrage of her setting up a blacklist for primary challengers.<\/p>\n She promised to listen, but then did nothing.<\/p>\n Rinse, lather, repeat.<\/p>\n \u2026\u2026\u2026 <\/p>\n The all-staff meeting was \u201cvery emotional all around,\u201d according to a committee aide. Multiple employees of the campaign arm got visibly upset and at least one demanded to hear directly from Bustos about the ongoing issues. She was not present. <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Of course she wasn’t there. She does not give a sh%$ what the staff thinks. <\/p>\n Some employees expressed anger during the meeting that the campaign arm\u2019s executive and deputy directors are not people of color. Others complained that only a small number of people of color are in positions reporting directly to Jaslow, contrary to Bustos\u2019 past promises to increase diversity in the senior DCCC ranks. <\/p>\n In addition, DCCC employees worried about how the lingering tensions with Democratic lawmakers would affect the campaign arm\u2019s ability to collect member dues. She’s a conservative Democrat, she thinks that the only way that Democrats can win is to dog whistle to the Handmaiden’s Tale<\/i> crowd and racists.<\/p>\n Unfortunately for Nancy Pelosi, Cheri Bustos is too crass, and perhaps too stupid pretend otherwise.<\/p>\n Democratic sources said an all-staff phone call with Bustos on Saturday didn’t go much better. The Illinois Democrat only \u201cbriefly\u201d apologized for comments about her family\u2019s racial background that had inflamed some lawmakers and DCCC employees. In response to complaints about the DCCC’s diversity, she has noted that her husband is of Mexican descent, that her children are half-Mexican and that her son is marrying an African-American woman. <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Ah, the “Some of my best friends,” stratagem, which never really worked.<\/p>\n Stupid. <\/p>\n Bustos\u2019 senior team did acknowledge anger among staffers that they did not know about the POLITICO article before it published. They promised to have a better internal communication strategy moving forward, according to multiple sources who participated in the call.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Shows that she does not have her staff’s back. <\/p>\n \u2026\u2026\u2026 <\/p>\n But multiple Democratic sources said they left Saturday’s call feeling like little is actually being done to address the diversity issues that have been simmering for months, or that Bustos understands the totality of the problem. <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n It’s not about Bustos understanding anything, she just doesn’t care.<\/p>\n I don’t think that Pelosi cares either beyond the obvious optics. Otherwise, she would not have appointed Bustos to such a sensitive position.<\/p>\n Bustos is heading the DCCC because Pelosi thinks that she has skills sucking up to rich ratf%$#s.<\/p>\n This has been the only criteria Pelosi has used for decades, and it’s finally biting her in the ass.<\/p>\n Good.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Nancy Pelosi has been putting faux Democrats with a history of recruiting other faux Democrats since she has led the party in the House of Representatives. I thought that she had truly scraped the bottom of the barrel with Steve Israel, who she literally praised as reptilian, but she has truly screwed the pooch with …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[513,447,375,588,578],"class_list":["post-177634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-campaign-finance","tag-congress","tag-elections","tag-fail","tag-incompetence"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177634"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=177634"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177634\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=177634"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=177634"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=177634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\u201cShe plans to approve changes to the structure before she leaves town and wants to get staff input as we work to build a stronger DCCC and make sure our team, from senior leadership on down, reflects the full range of diversity that gives the Democratic Party its strength,” Smith added. “She looks forward to reaching out to her colleagues to get their input, address their concerns and update them on the progress we are making.\u201d <\/p>\n
One current staffer complained that this is the third issue during Bustos\u2019 tenure that caught employees off guard. The other two were a controversial vendor blacklist<\/a> and outcry over a planned fundraiser<\/a> with a Democrat who opposes abortion rights. <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n