Democratic National Committee
Attn: Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Chair
430 South Capitol Street Southeast
Washington, DC 20003
Dear Debbie,
I’m writing this open letter to you as one deeply angered by DNC actions to manipulate outcomes in our current primary selection process under your leadership.
I always thought we voters were supposed to select our primary candidates, not have them pre-selected for us by the DNC.
Something’s extremely rotten at the DNC as you (former co-chair for Hillary in 2008) limit the number and scheduling of debates to best serve Hillary’s interests, minimize exposure for Sanders and O’Malley, and work to keep Larry Lessig, and his urgent political system reform message, out of the Democratic debates altogether.
Fundraising numbers through September 30th spotlight this discrimination.
• Lessig raised more than $1 million dollars from 10,000+ individuals, and has already qualified for federal matching funds.
• Lincoln Chaffee raised $408,000, of which $363,000 were loans to his campaign.
• Jim Webb raised $697,000.
Although most Americans likely do not know Lessig, a great many of those who do believe he’s a bright, articulate champion of the need to reform our political system and that it’s the number one issue, that underlies and distorts progress on almost all other issues. These supporters have either read his book, “Republic Lost”, or listened to his TED talks, or attended one or more of his few hundred talks to groups across the country discussing his proposals for reform.
But if candidate Lessig can generate this much enthusiastic support from the relatively small number of American voters who have heard of him, shouldn’t he deserve the chance to more broadly reach voters who haven’t yet gotten to know and evaluate him?
Apparently you and certain other leaders of the Democratic National Committee don’t think so.
You’ve portrayed Larry Lessig as a single issue candidate, lobbied to keep Lessig’s name off candidate preference polls used to select candidates for debate participation, specifically requested Iowa Democrats not invite him to their October 24th Jefferson Jackson dinner, and have also bared Lessig from upcoming debates on November 6th and 14th.
I invite you, and any other citizen, to go to https://lessig2016.us, read his positions on 16 different major issues, and then ask yourself again whether you still think of him as a single issue candidate.
Your actions are an ugly reminder of Boss Tweed’s infamous statement well over a century ago that “I don’t care who does the electing as long as I do the nominating.”
You’re way out-of-line and deeply wrong in this.
Consequently, I ask you to immediately invite Larry Lessig into the upcoming November debates, cease and desist from efforts to keep his name off candidate preference polls used by networks in determining popularity, begin work immediately to schedule many more debates in ways that minimize conflict with other prime time events and maximize exposure of ALL the candidates we citizens need to learn much more about in order to intelligently decide who we wish to vote for.
As soon as you’ve initiated this, I ask you to immediately resign. You’ve too thoroughly discredited both yourself, the integrity of our democratic process, and the DNC’s reputation to continue as Chair.
I’m sorry to have to write this as I consider myself a longtime supporter of many Democratic candidates.
But in a larger sense, I’m a proud citizen of these United States of America, and willing to stand with all who deeply desire an American political system that provides proper representation for the broad public interests of each of us.
Rick Hubbard