Pro-Sanders forces call out Wasserman Schultz over convention selections

Supporters of presidential candidate and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders fired a round across the bow of Democratic National Committee Chairperson Debbie Wasserman Schultz this week.

Former U.S. Secretary of Labor under Bill Clinton – and Sanders supporter- Robert Reich, recently posted on Facebook, accusing Wasserman Schultz of overwhelmingly choosing Hillary Clinton supporters for positions in three crucial convention committees: rules, credentials and platform.

Apparently Debbie Wasserman Schultz, chair of the Democratic National Committee, doesn’t care if she alienates Bernie followers. The Sanders campaign had been hoping for a significant role at the Democratic convention, but Wasserman Schultz has picked 75 members of the convention’s key committees — rules, credentials and platform – and accepted only 3 of Bernie’s choices, failing to acknowledge the proportion of the vote Bernie has won in the primaries and caucuses. Negotiations with the DNC have failed to add any additional Bernie picks to any of the standing committees.

On May 6 Sanders himself sent a letter to Wasserman Schultz:

“…I was so disappointed to learn that of the over forty people our campaign submitted at your request you chose to select only three of my recommendations for the three standing committees. Moreover, you did not assign even one of the people submitted by our campaign to the very important Rules Committee of the Democratic National Convention.”

Perhaps even worse was the appointment of what Sanders called Clinton’s “aggressive attack surrogates on the campaign trail” such as Barney Frank to prestigious positions such as the co-chair of the rules Committee.

Reich continued:

“This is insider politics run amok, at the very time and in the very election that insider politics is disdained – and at the very moment it’s vitally important to unite the Democratic Party. How Debbie Wasserman Schultz and the DNC be so obtuse?”