By Barnett Wright | The Birmingham Times
The delegate selection process in the state of Alabama has been governed “by a number of bad-faith actors” and the Democratic National Convention should “pay very close attention” to the delegation, according to a DNC document reviewed by the Birmingham Times.
A “Delegation Overview” has been compiled for each state that includes a synopsis of the delegation chair, notable delegates and the selection process.
“The delegation from Alabama is made up of strong supporters of the President and Vice President, the delegation process in Alabama has been governed by a number of bad-faith actors who have made very clear they will not be cooperating with us. We should continue to pay very, very close attention to this state before and during the convention in Chicago,” the overview reads.
The document did not name the “bad-faith actors” but friction between Alabama Democrats and the Alabama Democratic Party and the national party is not new.
In July, Alabama’s delegates voted unanimously to endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic nominee for president. The state has 52 delegates, plus four alternates.
However, Randy Kelley, chair of the Alabama State Democratic Party, has accused the DNC of engaging in “shenanigans” by appointing delegates to this week’s convention rather than allowing Alabama Democrats to elect their preferred delegate candidates.
After Kelley submitted a list of delegates, the Biden/Harris campaign (now d.b.a. Harris/Walz) rejected many of those and picked their own, after seeking suggestions from several Alabama Democrats including U.S. Rep. Terri Sewell, who now chairs the Alabama delegation.
The former Biden/Harris campaign said it selected the delegates “because of the largely unresponsive [Alabama] state party,” according to the document at the convention.
Jamie Harrison, chair of the Democratic National Committee, in a letter dated August 1, 2024, warned Kelley to “refrain from any further miscommunication or misinformation to convention participants” regarding the “status of Alabama’s delegation to the National Convention” in Chicago.
Kelley denied there was any “misinformation” but the problem was a national party that “handpicked” delegates that the people of Alabama did not get a chance to vote on, he told The Times last week. “No other [state] party in the history of the Democratic National Committee has been robbed of all delegates,” Kelley said. “… this is unprecedented.”
Harrison wrote that the Credentials Committee of the DNC on July 21, 2024, credentialed “the duly elected” Alabama district-level delegates to the convention.
Kelley told The Times that Alabama is “the only state in the Democratic Party and territories where we didn’t vote on a single delegate … the Democratic Party says it stands for a free and fair elections, [but] delegates were picked by some forces inside our party in the state along with people who don’t even live in Alabama,” he said.
Kelley added that he and his supporters, who include Joe Reed a longtime party leader and chairman of the Alabama Democratic Conference, the party’s most influential Black organization, have petitioned to go before the Credentials Committee in Chicago with their concerns. However, DNC Chair Harrison may have signaled that door has closed.
In his Aug. 1 letter to Kelley, Harrison wrote, “There are no pending credentials challenges and the window to file challenges has long passed … We look forward to supporting our Presidential and Vice Presidential nominees in Chicago and hope you will join us in working together to support the Democratic Party and our shared successes in November.”
Updated at 2:56 p.m. on 8/19/2024 to add DNC to the lede.
