Wasserman Schultz is out: Debbie Wasserman Schultz announced Sunday that she will be resigning her post as head of the Democratic National Committee. Her own supporters yelled back, standing on chairs and waving T-shirts bearing her name.
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Wasserman Schultz is telling the crowd during a raucous scene that “we have to make sure that we move together in a unified way”.
The hack of the Democratic committee’s emails, made public Friday by WikiLeaks, offered undeniable evidence of what Sanders’ supporters had complained about for much of the senator’s contentious primary with Clinton: The party was effectively an arm of Clinton’s campaign.
Left undecided as the delegation breakfast ended was whether Wasserman Schultz would convene the convention on Monday morning at the Wells Fargo Center. Elizabeth Warren, a favorite of liberals. The kickoff lineup had always been meant to appeal to the party’s restive liberal wing, but that task has become unexpectedly urgent by the trove of 19,000 leaked emails.
But that the investigation is just now starting hasn’t stopped the Democrats and Clinton campaign to attempt to deflect away from the contents of the leak to try to implicate Donald Trump as Putin’s stooge.
“It was concerning last week that Donald Trump changed the Republican platform to become what some experts would regard as pro-Russian”, Mook said.
“I wouldn’t put anything past the Kremlin”, Schiff said, calling Trump “a dream candidate for Moscow” and describing the Russians as “very afraid of Hillary Clinton”. The protester shouted “DNC leaks” soon after Clinton thanked Wasserman Schultz for her leadership at the DNC. Trump declared on Twitter: “The Dems Convention is cracking up”.
But party disunity also seems to be a factor in Philadelphia, given Sanders’ demands for a new leader and general unhappiness among his many supporters about how the nomination process unfolded.
In her statement, Wasserman Schultz said that she remains committed to seeing Clinton elected president.
CNN reported that her remarks to the delegates – expected to last just a few minutes – may come on Monday, a scenario the network says the Clinton and Sanders campaigns have tentatively agreed to. That led to her resignation as DNC chair on Sunday, though she said she will not do so until after the convention.
According to party sources, Wasserman Schultz’s role at the party’s convention this week will be severely limited.
“She lost the confidence of the President’s political team after it appeared she started using the DNC as her personal PAC, rather than reliably projecting his priorities and those of the party”, said a former White House aide.
There were several of Wasserman Schultz constituents wearing T-shirts advocating for her re-election in attendance.
At the Republican convention, Trump cast himself as the law-and-order candidate in a nation suffering under crime and hobbled by immigration, sticking to the gloom-and-doom theme.
Republicans, too, have tapped into viral fundraising with Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump leading the pack.
Clinton was campaigning in Charlotte, North Carolina, on Monday. Debbie Wasserman Schultz heckled out of her speaking role Monday at the Democratic National Convention; it’s also providing fodder for her congressional primary opponent.
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Delegates from IL include elected officials, longtime Hillary supporters – including childhood and longtime friends – and those with ties to Bill Clinton. She will formally accept the nomination on Thursday. President Barack Obama will speak on Wednesday night. If so, that revelation could cost Sanders support among Southern Baptists, the email said.
