10/9/21 update on the Fall 2021 DNC meeting:

It's been a long and impactful year for California Democrats. We've advocated for and passed a number of great bills, worked to support the President on the Build Back Better agenda, and successfully smashed the Republican recall attempt. I've continued my writing on these issues at Washington Monthly; advocated on Twitter; contacted legislators; organized locally on county issues; and walked precincts, phonebanked and sent over 70,000 texts to voters against the recall.

But efforts to continue to make our Democratic Party more transparent, accountable and effective also continue apace--both at the state and national level. At the state level, I am remaining active in the effort to ban the California Democratic Party from taking fossil fuel and police union money, so that our fundraising does not tarnish or corrupt our commitments to our goals on social, economic and environmental justice.

The big issue before the DNC at meeting was the election of at-large members to the DNC. These 75 members are crucial in determining the policies that get passed by our National Democratic Party, as they make or break majorities on most votes. Crucially, these members are supposed to be elected to their positions by the body.

Unfortunately, leadership decided to make an end run around the membership by engineering motions to suspend the rules to vote by acclamation on the at-large members, executive committee members and standing committee members. I was proud to vote NO on all of these motions to suspend the rules. Sadly, the NO side lost--but the NO vote was larger than most protest votes in the past. The reformist movement is growing.

The at-large members are supposed to be ELECTED, but no actual election was possible because the opportunity to even submit names for nomination was not available, and the nominations from leadership came at the very last minute. Also, there are at least a few objectionable names on leadership's list.

There was a rebellion brewing among the members over this, so leadership decided it would be safest to line up motions to suspend the rules and vote by acclamation, without any actual yeas or nays from the floor, and with no ability to speak for or against motions.

This is wrong for our party, and for our commitment to democracy. We can and should do better. Thank you for the opportunity to serve on the DNC, and I will continue to try to hold our party accountable to its values while working to elect more and better Democrats up and down the ballot.