Oregon Clinton Delegates Vote To Support Their Party -- But Where Is The Party?

Following Barack Obama's official nomination last night, delegates formerly pledged to Hillary Clinton have struggled to formally, as well as personally, bring closure to a historic and emotional chapter in American political history. At a suburban Denver hotel this morning, one group of Clinton delegates from the Oregon delegation took some time after a larger breakfast gathering to meet privately to discuss their next step. Ten minutes later, a representative emerged to issue an informal press release by handing it, handwritten on lined notebook paper, to two nearby bloggers.

These delegates' announcement is a sincere statement of their mature acceptance of Clinton's loss and their strong commitment to party unity. However, the fact that they felt they had to communicate their decision by handing it uncertainly to the closest media representative, rather that tapping into the DNC's professional, efficient media communication organization, suggests a potentially serious disconnect between the Democratic Party and the earnest, valuable Clinton delegates it both wants and needs to bring back into the fold. Clinton's delegates should have felt comfortable issuing their communique through the DNC; the DNC should have foreseen situations like this and gone out of its way to ensure that her delegates knew that they were welcome to do so.

If this vignette is representative, it may provide a window into the sense of isolation some Clinton delegates may be feeling as Clinton's trailblazing journey comes to an end -- and suggests that both the party and the Obama campaign still have work to do if they sincerely want to integrate this cadre of battle-hardened ground troops into a unified, and successful, campaign.

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Comments

[harrydemarest]

Oh come on. While Representative Sara Gelser, chair of the Clinton Delegation went upstairs to type the resolution and email it the the media guy at the Democratic Party of Oregon, I ran into a blogger or two and Rep Gelser ran into a few reporters who were hanging around. What are we supposed to do, make the bloggers wait until they read it in the newspaper? Make the reporters wait til they get a press release from the Democratic Party?

As far as why we felt a need to do this, The press has been claiming that many Hillary supporters would not support Obama or would vote for McCain, Our experience at this convention has been different. The overwhelming majority of Clinton Delegates plan to support Obama, We wanted to set the record straight.

In the current context we use the usual terminology, "Clinton Delegates" to refer to "pledged delegates to the Democratic National Convention who were pledged to vote for Hillary Clinton and unpledged delegates to the Democratic National Convention who have pledged to support Hillary Clinton" We find the two word phrase is more convenient to use than the thirty word phrase.

[mommadona]

"Clinton delegates"

Noooooo - you are DEMOCRATIC DELEGATES.

And I cannot believe the immaturity level of Clintonites.

[strangelet]

No, they were elected as Clinton delegates to the Democratic Convention.

And their maturity level in explicitly announcing their collective support for Obama is at least as high as yours in ragging on them for doing so.

[NorVaGal]

Breaking news: The DNC is not perfect 24/7!!! OMG- what is the world coming to??? Of course, BOTH sides could have gone out of their way to foresee problems like this and strived to make sure all delegates knew what the protocol would be. Even better, BOTH sides just could take pride and credit for the good that they each achieved, and learn from their mistakes.

I think that the Oregon Delegates and the DNC both did a great job in a very difficult situation, and each should be commended. None of them were perfect; and, thank goodness, none of them had to be. Kudos to all involved!