Howard Dean on the eligibility for the debate on the PBS NewsHour

[question everything]

(snip)

After showing a clip of a very unhappy Bennet

Howard Dean:

Well, you have to have some or order to this.

And I will say, Michael Bennet, first of all, is one of my favorite candidates. But the truth is,you cannot have what the Republicans had, which was these chaotic series of debates, which then went on to nominate somebody who ended up as president, but is probably the worst president in the United States' history.

We have to have a reasonably orderly process. Now, Michael has another shot, as do some of the other people who didn't get to the criteria this time. The same criteria applies to next month's debates.

But at some point, if you can't get the grassroots together, and raise the money, and be in 20 states and raise your profile, then you can't be on the debate stage. There are 600 people, roughly, that run for president all the time. And most of them never get on the debate stage. There has to be some order to this.


Judy Woodruff:

You are saying at some point there has to be some order.

But as the campaign of Senator Bennet is pointing out, we are still five months away from the first voters voting, and they are asking, why is the DNC in a rush to squeeze, to winnow this field?


Howard Dean:

Well, they don't necessarily — look, the winnowers of the field are the people that aren't raising the money and aren't — don't have the grassroots efforts.

Now they have another month to do it, and I think that's fair. Even if they don't get it done in the next month, they can still go into Iowa, and there will be other forums and so forth and so on.

But you cannot have the spectacle that went on in 2016 in the Republican Party. And that's what these rules are aimed at trying to not have.

Judy Woodruff:

But, again, I guess, Governor, the question they're raising is that, why shouldn't this be up to the voters who are going to be voting in early 2020, rather than up to the Democratic Party officials?

And, frankly, some of the candidates are saying the process has not been transparent.



Howard Dean:

It is transparent. And it is up to the voters.

If the voters choose one of these folks, and some of these folks didn't get on the stage in the next week end up in the top three in Iowa, or New Hampshire, or Nevada, or South Carolina, then they will be in the primary. We're not excluding anybody from the process.

We are trying to maintain a reasonable set of criteria, so people can listen to what is going on in the debates. If I have had my way, I actually still would have had two nights. I just would have had five people on each night.

(snip)



Howard Dean:

Yes, sure. Yes, but I'm not the chairman of the party. Tom is the chairman of the party.

And, believe me, look, the party was in worse — party was in pretty bad shape when I took it over. It was in worse shape when Tom took it over. So of course we're going to — there's always going to be differences of opinions.

But I'm going to stand up for Tom Perez as long as I think he's doing the best he can. And I think he's doing the best he can.

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/howard-dean-on-the-eligibility-criteria-for-2020-democratic-debates

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Wonder whether there is bad blood between Dean and Obama

[OnDoutside]

1. I think it is generally regarded that the DNC was in bad shape when

Perez took over, and BO had taken his eye off the ball. They had lost over a 1000 state seats over that time.

[question everything]

3. Also, Dean, with his 50 states strategy was behind the Obama win

But soon after that he was no longer the head of the DNC.

[OnDoutside]

4. Good point.

[dalton99a]

5. +1

[RussellCattle]

2. I think that we should recognize that "responders to a early poll" are....

....different from "voters in an early primary" and we should not be too quick to marginalize lesser candidates. That said, we give way too much power to the powers that be , the parties themselves, in their roles of picking for us who our two choices will be every four years.