The congressional Democrats are on the verge of electing Hakeem Jeffries their post-Pelosi party leader. You'll hear a lot about "first person of color." What you won't hear much of is "100% creature of Wall Street." Nor will you read that Jeffries is a vicious and divisive anti-progressive fanatic. It will take years before that becomes part of the narrative, just like it took years for people to finally understand who Rahm Emanuel is and who Debbie Wasserman Schultz is. You like them? If you do, you'll be fine with Hakeem as well.
If you've been following DWT with any regularity, you already know Jeffries is coordinating a jihad against progressive candidates across the country, working with AIPAC, Mark Mellman's Democratic Majority For Israel and crypto-billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried, spending millions of dollars against challengers Nina Turner (OH), Erica Smith (NC), Summer Lee (PA), Kina Collin (IL), Cristina Garcia (CA), Nida Allam (NC), Jessica Cisneros (TX), Imani Oakley (NJ), Daniel Lee (CA), Jamie McLeod-Skinner (OR), Michelle Vallejo (TX), David Canepa (CA), Amy Vilela (NV) and, more recently, against progressive incumbents-- Marie Newman, Andy Levin and Rashida Tlaib.
Jeffries also gets the New Dems' and the Blue Dogs' superPACs involved in races he deems appropriate. He's the man behind the curtain and the Democratic rank and file in the House is sleep-walking into making him their leader. And that includes the House progressives as well!
This morning, The Intercept pointed out another sewer money group Jeffries is deploying against progressives, the innocuously named Opportunity for All Action Fund. Akela Lacy reported that they've already spent over half a million dollars in 4 races in support of conservatives, while refusing to disclose where the money is coming from, "yet another incursion into dark money and outside spending from mainstream Democrats," she wrote, "desperate to defend against progressive challengers... The cutout has not revealed who ultimately decided to launch the operation or who is funding it, but several public details give clues about its origins. For one, each of the incumbents is also backed by Team Blue PAC, launched last June by House Democratic Caucus Chair Hakeem Jeffries of New York, New Jersey Rep. Josh Gottheimer, and Alabama Rep. Terri Sewell to protect caucus members facing primary challenges [albeit not Newman, Levin or Tlaib]. Team Blue PAC endorsed five incumbents in February and has given $5,000 to each of their campaigns, including Davis, Titus, Payne, and Reps. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY), and Shontel Brown (D-OH), who beat former state Sen. Nina Turner last month. Jeffries campaigned alongside Danny Davis in Chicago last week, and also campaigned for Donald Payne and Brown."
Opportunity for All Action Fund also spent in an effort to defeat Frank Pallotta, the winner of the Republican primary who will face Gottheimer, one of the Democratic caucus’s most conservative members and Team Blue PAC’s co-founder, in November. The group spent more than $150,000 to oppose candidate Pallotta, a Trump Republican who won the GOP race on Tuesday. Pallotta came within 8 points of unseating Gottheimer in 2020. The group also sent mailers in the race attacking Pallotta.
The slew of spending comes as Jeffries and Gottheimer escalate an ongoing battle with the progressive wing of the party and Jeffries pursues a path toward becoming House speaker or minority leader, replacing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi when she eventually retires. Neither office responded to a request for comment.
Opportunity for All Action Fund’s bare-bones website and “OFA” logo led a local New Jersey site writing about the fund to wonder whether it was “a misleading bid to implicate Obama for America.” The group is indeed run by Patti Solis Doyle, a partner at the Brunswick Group and a former adviser to President Barack Obama’s 2012 reelection campaign who also managed Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential bid; Darrel Thompson, a partner with the GROUP who was previously a top staffer for former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, chief of staff for Obama’s 2004 Senate campaign, and financial services director for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee; and Mike McKay, founding and managing partner at the Miami-based Empire Consulting Group and a former staffer for Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY) Empire Consulting Group’s co-managing partner, Chaka Burgess, is on the board of the Congressional Black Caucus PAC along with Jeffries, who is also a CBC member alongside Sewell, Payne, and Meeks. Opportunity for All Action Fund lists as its incorporator Emma Olson Sharkey, an associate at Elias Law Group, a firm founded in August by lawyer Marc Elias, who was general counsel for Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign.
Top House Democrats and outside groups have backed embattled incumbents facing progressive candidates in several competitive primaries this year, including the caucus’s last member to oppose abortion rights, conservative Texas Rep. Henry Cuellar. Another group called Mainstream Democrats PAC, backed by LinkedIn founder and major Democratic donor Reid Hoffman, is also boosting those efforts and has spent more than $1 million since April to fight progressives in three competitive races, including Cuellar’s opponent, Cisneros, as well as Turner and Jamie McLeod-Skinner, who beat Rep. Kurt Schrader in Oregon.
Ready to start supporting the kinds of progressives that Jeffries and his cabal are sabotaging? I hope so. If everyone who reads this post donates $10, our candidates who be able to access... at least $10, since I know at least one person is reading it-- YOU! We fought back and succeeded with Jamie McLeod-Skinner, Summer Lee and Michelle Vallejo. If you want my recommendations, they're all here. Or just hit the 2022 congressional thermometer on the left-- it's live-- and give what you can or what you feel comfortable giving. Just for starters, Sergio, Jason, Melanie... have primaries coming up, primaries pitting them against corrupt conservatives.