MDP Leadership Admits Six Years of Rule Breaking
And TWO Open Challenges to the MDP
This article continues the story of the MDP botching the U of M Regents nomination at the August 2024 State Convention. Since then, an MDP lawyer told Congresswoman Tlaib that the MDP “never” follows their own rules, and the Huwaida campaign sued the MDP, Chair Barnes, and Secretary of State Benson, in state court. I testified at and wrote about the hearing.
Following MDP leadership’s continued refusal to handle these issues internally, the Huwaida campaign has now filed a case in federal court. Notice MDP leadership doesn’t actually care if they tank the Harris campaign in Michigan with a bunch of bad press about their anti-democratic practices. They had the opportunity to handle these issues internally, outside of the courts. Beginning the night of the Convention, Huwaida wanted to handle this internally, and repeatedly requested MDP leadership meet and discuss these issues. By refusing to even discuss these issues, Chair Barnes and Executive Director Jensen deliberately chose to force this into court, into the media. Given that decision, I have no reason to believe they care about defeating Trump. If they cared about defeating Trump, they would have handled this internally.
What do Chair Barnes and ED Jensen care about more than Harris winning Michigan? Maybe it has something to do with an Illitch being on the ballot, with her money. Maybe it’s just they don’t like anyone questioning them. I don’t claim to know, but it’s a question worth asking.
I just received MDP leadership’s response to the Huwaida campaign’s August 28th MDP appeal, and it’s epically Trumpian, including the projection: every accusation is a confession.
They accuse the Huwaida campaign of being election deniers - despite the mountain of evidence supporting the Huwaida campaign’s allegations. The problem with Trump’s assertions is that they’re false. The Huwaida campaign’s assertions are true. MDP leadership smearing the campaign like that is epically Trumpian - a blatantly false smear accusing others of what MDP leadership are themselves doing: trying to steal an election.
MDP leadership claims “the MDP administered its State Nominating Convention in compliance with the MDP bylaws, our Call to Convention and Michigan Election Law.”
Cool.
Here’s a challenge for the MDP: cite the bylaws by section and quote the language that authorized majority voting in an election for two positions of the same office, in this case U of M Regent.
I’ll wait.
Meanwhile, here are some undisputed facts about MDP Bylaws and Rules for Voting and Elections (RVE):
MDP Rule 2.5 reads, in relevant part, “No bylaw adopted by any unit of the MDP shall be valid unless publicly posted on the MDP website.”
MDP Rule 10.1 reads in full: “The State Convention is a statewide unit of the MDP and shall be the highest authority of the MDP, subject to these rules.” There isn’t any authority higher than the State Convention in the MDP, and the State Convention is explicitly subject to the rules posted on the MDP website.
The only rules ever posted on the MDP website during the last six years are the Bylaws and the RVE.
Therefore, the only rules valid during an MDP State Convention are the Bylaws and RVE as posted on the MDP website for the last six years.
Rules for Voting and Election (RVE) 1.1 reads in full:
”These rules provide procedures to be used for all voting and elections at the various levels of the Michigan Democratic Party: State Convention, Congressional District caucuses, conventions, and meetings, County conventions and meetings, and meetings of constituency caucuses or clubs which are chartered by the MDP or one of its units. No other voting procedures are approved for use within the MDP.”
(Emphasis added)There were two positions to be elected to the same office, U of M Regent.
Therefore, this is a multiple-position office by RVE 2.1 “multiple-position office: an office for which more than one person is to be elected. Examples are [meaning what follows are examples, not a complete list]… .”
RVE 6.1 says,
”Multiple-position offices, such as [meaning what follow are examples, not a complete list]… , must be elected by one of the methods approved for implementing proportional representation, detailed below in 6.4 and 6.5”
(Emphasis added)
The tabulation procedure used at the August 24th State Convention was majority voting. Majority voting is in RVE 5.0 - 5.4, not 6.4 or 6.5. There is no majority voting in 6.4 and 6.5. Therefore, MDP violated their rules.
The MDP wants to claim that because U of M Regents are not explicitly listed among the examples given in 2.1 and 6.1, U of M Regent nominations are not subject to these rules.
This is obviously false.
RVE 1.1 says these rules are for “all voting and elections at the various levels” of the MDP, explicitly including “State Conventions”. These rules are not limited to the examples given, they are applicable to “all voting and elections” in the MDP. As RVE 1.1 emphasizes a second time, “No other voting procedures are approved for use within the MDP.”
The U of M Regents’ nominating vote was a vote taken “within the MDP.”
Therefore the RVE applies.
Period.
MDP leadership goes on to explicitly claim that RVE rules “do not apply to and have not been used by the MDP to determine which candidates for partisan offices will appear on the November general election ballot” (emphasis added).
Cool.
Here’s another challenge for the MDP:
First, since MDP claims the RVE doesn’t apply, please cite the rules that do apply.
Or are there no rules that actually apply?
Is MDP is just making it up as they go along?
Where are the rules for nominating these powerful positions in our State Government written down?
Second, by what authority do these secrete rules no one has ever seen override RVE 1.1, 2.1, 6.1, and 6.4 or any other rules posted to the MDP website? If these secret rules were not published to the MDP website, and they weren’t, how are they exempt from our Bylaws 2.5 and 2.14? Bylaw 2.14 requires the MDP to “publish” and “publicize” a “full description of the legal and practical procedures” for how each election will be run at least 30 days in advance of the voting (full details here)1 . The only rules published on their website any time in the past six years are the Bylaws and the RVE.
As ought to be blindingly obvious, the MDP doesn’t have any such rules, certainly not any that are written down. Or posted on their website. Or valid, given MDP Rule 2.5.
They’re just blatantly lying, exactly like Trump.
When they say that the RVE rules “have not been used by the MDP” in these nominations, they are blatantly admitting in public, exactly like Trump, that they’ve been breaking their own rules for at least six years, since the new MDP rules were adopted in 2018.
And let’s be clear, they know they are lying. This is obvious when you consider the absurd statement about this author included in their response. MDP writes in a footnote, “Liano Sharon who has signed on to this appeal has been present at the majority of Fall Nominating Conventions since the re-write of the MDP Bylaws in 2018 and has never lodged an objection to the majority vote method of voting used at the Nominating Convention for general election candidates.”
Here’s a whole article I wrote back in 2021 about the problems with the Fall Nominating Conventions: MDP Leadership Sabotages Party Elections, State Primaries, where I talk about these nominations explicitly.
The article details MDP leadership overturning the results of the proportional voting election for State Central Committee delegates held at the State Convention. The accomplished this by appointing 80+ “officers-at-large” when our rules specify that “officers” must be “elect[ed]” (MDP Bylaws 7.1.1). MDP leadership didn’t want to elect them according to the rules because its obviously a multiple-position office (80+ positions) and they’d have to use slate voting. Exactly the situation in the current Huwaida campaign case. Just like in 2021, MDP leadership is attempting to prevent the minority from holding power. Here’s an excerpt where I talk about these nominations for powerful state offices specifically:
Why should anyone care?
First, Members of the Party should care because it’s our Party … [leadership is] actively driving people away from the Party with this illicit behavior. Members have an interest in seeing the rules followed, and when violated, fairly adjudicated.
Second, the Michigan Democratic Party, and more specifically the State Central Committee as it’s governing body, is charged by our State Constitution (Article V Section 21) and various statutes to run the primary elections for Lieutenant Governor, Attorney General, Secretary of State, Michigan Supreme Court Justices, University Boards, and other positions. Boss Tweed of Tammany Hall, perhaps the most notoriously corrupt Democrat, is famous for saying “I don’t care who does the voting, so long as I get to do the nominating.” Controlling the nomination is controlling the options available to voters. If the only options available to voters are selected by the Chair … their choices, not the voters’ choices, determine the outcome of the election. That’s oligarchy, not democracy.
I have raised the issue of these nominating processes many times, including directly to Chair Barnes and Executive Director (ED) Jensen. I have explicitly raised the issue of slate voting vs majority voting to ED Jensen regarding these nominations several times between 2018 and 2022. Her answer was always one version or another of “no one cares about the rules except you,” followed by blowing off the objection and walking away.
ED Jensen has signed at least two public documents where she’s admitted the MDP has been breaking it’s own rules for at least six years, the response to the Huwaida campaign’s August 28th appeal and her declaration submitted during the court hearing on September 6th - as I pointed out from the witness stand. Both times by asserting MDP leadership has never followed it’s own rules for multiple-position offices, as if that’s a reason they shouldn’t have to follow their written rules now. Notice that this is exactly the fact the MDP leadership’s lawyer, Sheila Cummings, confessed to Congresswoman Tlaib.
Exactly like Trump, MDP leadership is admitting their lawlessness and acting as if it’s perfectly normal, nothing to see here, just move along. And then accusing others of being Trumpian.
Deeply Trumpian behavior from Chair Barnes, ED Jensen, and lawyer Cummings.
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For those interested: here’s the story of what happened when I first joined the MDP, and my 4 year progress report (2016 -2020), after which I was elected to the Democratic National Committee (DNC) on the Solidarity Slate (also see the platform). Here’s my 2023 DNC report. I’ll write a final DNC report before the end of the year when my term ends. Some other good articles from this era include this piece on clearly distinguishing between capitalism and markets, this one on collective bargaining, and this piece on cargo cult democracy. For a summary of many of the problems in the Democratic Party, see this press packet.
In the past, MDP has said the published rules on their website satisfies the 2.14 requirement. For example, in this denial (page 7) of this appeal, the MDP Appeals Committee rules that the State Party posting the Party rules on the State Party website, was sufficient even for other units of the Party to satisfy Rule 2.14 (then under a different rule number, changed in the 2018 rules review).