The move by the DNC to block the public viewing regarding its internal autopsy report concerning the last presidential race appears shocking yet entirely predictable. Averse to unpleasant candor, the party's leadership apparatus behaves closer to a communications shop rather than an electoral entity devoted to cultivating grassroots capacities for winning elections.
A Climate That Avoids Dissent
Unwilling to challenge the prevailing attitude of conformity, the committee has continued under the Biden-Harris shadow all through this past year. Releasing such a report would have indicated that party leaders actually want to foster honest conversation regarding the strategic failures that enabled Donald Trump to return to the White House. Instead, the committee is acting under the pretense that there's nothing to understand from the stunning loss from the last cycle.
Our guiding principle: will this lead to victory? If not, it is an unnecessary diversion from what truly matters," a rationale which was presented for withholding the report.
Critical Problems an Analysis Could Have Explored
An autopsy report with any value would tackle head-on key points of failure. Among them are:
- Electoral Disenchantment: Losing among millions of voters who voted for the Democratic ticket during the previous election proved pivotal in the close recent race.
- A Choice to Run: The stubborn choice by the incumbent to run again, coupled with a last-minute exit, has been criticized as robbing the party's base the chance for open primaries.
- Abandoning the Working-Class Base: Amid rising costs, the electoral effort allegedly bowing to elite contributors and not managing to address the role of corporate greed.
- The Foreign Policy Factor: The failure to shift a policy position regarding a ongoing war allegedly caused alienating significant blocs, notably among youth voters, Arab American communities, Muslim voters.
- Eroding Young Voter Support: Polling data shows a significant decline of support for the party among voters aged 18-29.
A Pattern of Evasion
The decision to withhold aligns with a recurring tendency of sidestepping uncomfortable facts. It echoes a dynamic where nearly all elected Democrat in Washington went along with an incumbent's insistence on running for re-election until a catastrophic campaign event compelled an exit.
Concurrently, overwhelming numbers within the party's base were continually telling surveyors that they did not want the incumbent to seek re-election.
Campaign Spending Questions
A thorough autopsy could probe issues regarding campaign spending, including how much money flowed to party strategists as well as advertising contractors during an electoral effort that burned through a staggering war chest over a few months.
The Underlying Problem
Fundamentally, the secrecy of the official autopsy is symptomatic of a deference toward the established hierarchy that oversaw an unsuccessful electoral effort. The message to rank-and-file members – which includes countless loyal volunteers – is that they do not be trusted to understand what the insiders say they discovered from an analysis compiled from feedback from all states.
A political entity unwilling to honestly assess where it went wrong is unlikely to climb out of the cycle that ended up being so advantageous to their opponents.
