As a young lawyer and Sanders supporter, I was very interested to read the lawsuit filed by the Sanders’ campaign regarding the DNC’s decision to deny the campaign access to DNC voter data.
Paragraph 13 of the Complaint is particularly important as it recites the termination clause of the agreement between the DNC and the Sanders’ campaign:
Either party may terminate this Agreement in the event that the other party breaches this Agreement; the non-breaching party sends written notice to the breaching party describing the breach; and the breaching party does not cure the breach to the satisfaction of the non-breaching party within ten (10) calendar days following its receipt of such notice.
The facts about what happened are still developing, but assuming there are no other provisions in the agreement between the DNC and the campaign, the DNC’s actions appears to be an obvious violation of the agreement.
From what I have read, it sounds like the Sanders’ staffer did not handle the situation in a way most people would consider appropriate. From a legal perspective, however, the Complaint (paragraph 19) claims that the actions, even if stupid or improper, were not a violation of the agreement with the DNC:
The Agreement does not obligate the Campaign to maintain specific security measures with respect to Confidential Information, to notify the DNC of security breaches arising in the DNC’s Voter Data systems, or to protect any confidential information inadvertently disclosed to the Campaign by the DNC.
Thus, the DNC did not appropriately terminate the agreement and there would be no valid reason to justify the DNC terminating the agreement.
It will be interesting to see the DNC’s response, but on the face of the Complaint the DNC should be ordered to immediately restore access to the campaign data. The DNC should also have to pay some amount of damages for breaching the agreement.
