{"id":6665,"date":"2017-11-03T11:36:32","date_gmt":"2017-11-03T18:36:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=6665"},"modified":"2017-11-03T11:36:32","modified_gmt":"2017-11-03T18:36:32","slug":"deeply-disturbing-bombshell-piece-exposes-unethical-clinton-dnc-fundraising-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2017\/11\/03\/deeply-disturbing-bombshell-piece-exposes-unethical-clinton-dnc-fundraising-deal\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Deeply Disturbing’: Bombshell Piece Exposes ‘Unethical’ Clinton-DNC Fundraising Deal"},"content":{"rendered":"
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November 02, 2017\u00a0<\/span><\/span>by Common Dreams<\/a><\/div>\n
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Former interim chair of the DNC Donna Brazile highlights the agreement that effectively gave the Clinton team full control of the organization as early as 2015<\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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by\u00a0Jake Johnson, staff writer<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s husband and former U.S. President Bill Clinton talks with daughter, Chelsea Clinton during the Presidential Debate at Hofstra University on September 26, 2016 in Hempstead, New York. (Photo: Joe Raedle\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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In an explosive and “deeply disturbing<\/a>” piece for\u00a0Politico<\/em>\u00a0Magazine<\/em>\u00a0on Thursday, former interim chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) Donna Brazile drew upon her brief experience at the organization’s helm to reveal the extent to which the 2016 nomination process was “rigged” in favor of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.<\/p>\n

In her account, Brazile details the deep “internal corruption” of the DNC, the role the ostensibly neutral governing body played as a “fundraising clearing house” for the Clinton team, and how those dynamics unfairly handicapped primary challenger Bernie Sanders.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Shame on the DNC, on Hillary Clinton, and every Democratic operative responsible for this bullshit. What a mess.”
\n\u2014Shaun King,\u00a0The Intercept<\/em><\/p>\n

Many of the DNC’s most deeply embedded issues, Brazile notes, spring both from former chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s poor management and former President Barack Obama’s neglect, which left the committee deeply in debt.<\/p>\n

In August 2015, the Clinton campaign\u2014along with the joint fundraising vehicle with the DNC, the Hillary Victory Fund\u2014came to an agreement with the committee to begin to pay off this debt, which had soared to $24 million. In exchange, the DNC’s finances were placed “fully under the control” of the Clinton team, “which seemed to confirm the suspicions of the Bernie camp,” Brazile writes.<\/p>\n

“When the party chooses the nominee, the custom is that the candidate’s team starts to exercise more control over the party,” Brazile observed. “This victory fund agreement, however, had been signed…just four months after Hillary announced her candidacy and nearly a year before she officially had the nomination.”<\/p>\n

Brazile goes on to describe the terms of the agreement, which she describes as “unethical”:<\/p>\n

The agreement…specified that in exchange for raising money and investing in the DNC, Hillary would control the party’s finances, strategy, and all the money raised. Her campaign had the right of refusal of who would be the party communications director, and it would make final decisions on all the other staff. The DNC also was required to consult with the campaign about all other staffing, budgeting, data, analytics, and mailings.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Brazile concludes the piece, which is an adapted excerpt from her forthcoming book, by detailing a conversation she had with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) shortly after she found the “cancer” at the heart of the DNC\u2014this so-called “Joint Fundraising Agreement.”<\/p>\n

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“How much control Brooklyn had and for how long was still something I had been trying to uncover for the last few weeks. By September 7, the day I called Bernie, I had found my proof and it broke my heart,” Brazile writes. “I explained that the cancer was that she had exerted this control of the party long before she became its nominee….Bernie took this stoically. He did not yell or express outrage. Instead he asked me what I thought Hillary’s chances were.”<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Unsurprisingly, Brazile’s account immediately caught fire on social media, provoking a mixture of outrage and vindication\u2014particularly given that it comes from a “stalwart<\/a>” establishment insider who\u00a0admitted to<\/a>\u00a0passing debate topics to the Clinton team during her time as a\u00a0CNN<\/em>\u00a0contributor.<\/p>\n

“Shame on the DNC, on Hillary Clinton, and every Democratic operative responsible for this bullshit. What a mess,”\u00a0The Intercept<\/em>‘s Shaun King wrote on Twitter.<\/p>\n

“Since the election, it is not clear that the DNC has dealt with these problems yet,”\u00a0writes<\/a>Clio Chang of\u00a0Splinter News<\/em>, building on King’s point. “Tom Perez was installed as DNC chair over Keith Ellison, a move that was\u00a0largely seen<\/a>\u00a0as giving Democratic elites more control over the party….The DNC is not doomed to repeat the problems of the past, but from Brazile’s account, it’s clear that the organization requires a major reckoning.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n