WASHINGTON — The Democratic National Committee is setting up a vote among members to decide whether to conduct a new election on two of the the party’s vice chair positions, one of which is currently held by David Hogg. The activist and 2018 Parkland school shooting survivor has recently been in the spotlight over his pledged effort to challenge some Democratic incumbents in the upcoming midterm elections.
This week, a DNC subcommittee passed a resolution recommending that members hold fresh votes for two of its vice chair roles held by Hogg and Pennsylvania lawmakers Malcolm Kenyatta, who won the seats as part of the party’s officer elections on Feb. 1, following a complaint filed from one of the unsuccessful candidates for the position.
The complaint from former candidate Kalyn Free argued that the DNC violated its charter, bylaws and election rules in the February contest in a way that led to “three women of color being shut out of challenging a man on the third ballot for the last vice chair position.”
In a series of posts on X, Christine Pelosi, a member of the subcommittee that recommended the new election this week and the daughter of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, sought to stress that the decision to advise a fresh vote had nothing to do with Hogg or Kenyatta and instead was about a “parliamentary procedure” matter with the way the initial tally was carried out.
According to Pelosi, after DNC members selected one person to fill a vice chair role with a clear majority in the Feb. 1 elections, the remaining two vice chair positions were voted on via a “combined ballot,” a method Free subsequently argued violated the party’s rules.
Pelosi went on to stress that both Hogg and Kenyatta would be eligible to put their names on the ballot again in any potential re-vote.
In a statement on Tuesday, Kenyatta sought to push back on any insinuation that the decision from the committee had anything to do with Hogg’s controversial primary election effort.
“This procedural challenge was initiated shortly after the DNC elections held in February and is entirely unrelated to David Hogg’s advocacy for primary challenges against incumbent Democrats, contrary to recent reporting that may be either misinformed or deliberately misleading,” he wrote.
He went further in a series of posts on X, calling the way in which the committee went about the decision a “slap in my face” and adding that Hogg “clearly wants” to make the situation about him.
Hogg, who entered the national spotlight after surviving the 2018 Parkland school shooting, received significant attention over the last few weeks for his plan to put millions of dollars into an effort via his political action committee to oust particular sitting Democratic lawmakers he views as too old or ineffective in primaries.
The announcement led newly elected DNC Chair Ken Martin to vocally push back, saying DNC officials should not be weighing in on primary contests between two Democratic candidates. Martin added at the time that Hogg is free to pursue such an effort should he wish, just not as an official DNC officer, as it would break from the tradition of the national Democratic party staying out of its primary contests.
In a statement reported by multiple outlets in response to the DNC’s decision to move forward with a potential new vote, Hogg acknowledged it was about the procedures with which the vote in February was carried out while argued it is “impossible to ignore the broader context of my work to reform the party which loomed large over this vote.”
It all comes as the Democratic party has been searching for a unified message in the wake of former President Joe Biden's exit from the 2024 presidential race and its subsequent losses in election.