MSNBC Live will co-host an event later today that is typically “inside baseball”: The final forum of the candidates to lead the Democratic National Committee.
The event is being held along with Georgetown’s Institute of Politics and Public Service, and streamed on the network’s YouTube channel starting at 3 p.m., the event is nevertheless one of the first major steps for the party after crushing losses in the presidential election.
Jen Psaki, the host of MSNBC’s Inside, will co-host with Symone Sanders Townsend and Jonathan Capehart, and Luke Russert, creative director of MSNBC Live.
“It’s something that viewers deeply care about. At a time where people feel who didn’t support or vote for the current president feel powerless, or feel like they don’t know how to come out of the wilderness, this is one of those things that will matter,” Psaki said.
The vote will take place on Saturday, with a large field of candidates vying for the position. The most prominent candidates for chair are Ken Martin, chair of the Minnesota DFL; Ben Wikler, chair of the Wisconsin Democratic Party; Faiz Shakir, former chair of Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign; and Martin O’Malley, the former governor of Maryland.
Townsend said that while the race may seem to be “inside baseball,” it “has large outside implications for the direction of the Democratic party apparatus.”
“At the end of the day, the DNC chair does have a lot of outsized influence,” she said. “And in absence of your party being in the White House, they lead and make the decisions, and how they lead matters.”
The post-election period has seen a rather dramatic fall off in MSNBC’s audience, likely as so many Democrats tuned out to an environment where Donald Trump savored his election victory. The network in recent weeks has since seen signs of an audience uptick, while Rachel Maddow has returned to a weeknight schedule for the first 100 days.
Capehart, host of The Saturday/Sunday Show, said, “I’ve been through this cyclical rodeo many times. The diminishment in the ratings after the election is like the seasons. We all saw it coming because we’ve lived through it after Obama, after ’16, after ’20. It’s just folks are tired of politics, or they’re just tired, and they need to take a break. And the one thing that we have seen is that the audience is coming back.”
The forum is not part of a plan to get the audience back, but the latest in the network’s foray into live events. In September, MSNBC hosted MSNBC Live: Democracy 2024, a daylong event in September at the Brooklyn Academy of Music featuring network hosts and about 4,000 attendees. Such in-person gatherings are not entirely new — rival Fox News has done the same thing in the past. But reinforcing a connection with viewers with in-person gatherings may be especially important as MSNBC prepares to be spun off from Comcast, in a transaction expected to be completed later this year.
Townsend said that the turnout at the September event — attendees purchased tickets — was an indication of the engagement of the MSNBC viewership. “While some people are like, ‘I don’t know. I want to watch Netflix,’ they are paying attention and they care about this. I don’t think this is bringing them back. People are already there, but it’s about meeting them where they are,” she said.
The Democrats’ soul searching and finger waving over what went wrong in 2024 has run the gamut, from Joe Biden’s decision to run for reelection, to the party’s inability to match Donald Trump’s connection with voters on social media and podcasts, to underestimating the power of immigration as a top issue until it was too late.
The extent of the party’s troubles was reinforced in the latest Qunnipiac poll this week showed that 31% of those surveyed had a favorable opinion of the Democratic party, and 57% have an unfavorable opinion. Republicans have a 43% favorable and 45% unfavorable.
“I don’t think it’s a messaging problem,” Capehart said. “I think part of it is a misinformation problem — misinformation in the sense, is the electorate getting the information that they need?”
He said that the party has to come up with a plan to address it. “If a candidate is out there saying, ‘Here’s my plan for the economy, here’s my plan for healthcare, here’s my plan for all these things.’ And yet, half the country keeps saying, ‘Well, I don’t know what they stand for. I don’t know what their plan is.’ Well then the issue then becomes, ‘What are you doing to get around their information loops, their information silos, so that they understand that this isn’t just a one-way conversation, that all your concerns are being addressed in some way by the candidate from the Democratic Party?’ And I think that’s a big challenge for the next chair of party, but also for all the people up and down the leadership structure of the DNC.”
Psaki said, “One of my takeaways from the leading up to November is that there wasn’t enough fearlessness in terms of how a broad range of Democrats running were communicating, and what platforms they were willing to engage with. And also that there needs to be more of a thought of meeting people where they are, which is something you use a lot in communications, and it’s maybe overused, but it is true for candidates.”
She said that there can still sometime be a view that by an op ed in the print version of The Washington Post, “everyone will see it,” she said. “It is no longer the case.”
“That’s one of the things I’m interested in — creative, out of the box, ideas, a fearlessness about how they’re going to engage and who they’re going to engage with, a creative look at how they’re going to spend money. It’s hard to fundraise right now. How are they going to do it?”
Democrats have long embraced Hollywood’s financial contributions and celebrity support and endorsements — and Republicans have been quick to use that attention to attack their rivals as the party of elites.
Martin said at a previous forum, per the Post, “I don’t rub elbows with billionaires or Hollywood elites. I rub elbows with working people in union halls, at picket lines, at civil rights marches and at protests.” The line rubbed some in the entertainment industry the wrong way.
That said, the next DNC chair may be walking a bit of a tightrope, with immediate demands to fundraise from the party’s traditional ATMs, but also to recast the party in the public mindset as one devoted to the working class.
“I think people will say, ‘It’s a disaster. There’s no clear leader.’ I see it very differently,” Psaki said. “I see it as a huge opportunity, because it’s actually a moment where people can get involved and engaged, and grassroots groups can get engaged, and people in the country, and pay attention to things like the DNC race, but also local elections.”
The election this weekend will be of 448 members who have specific interests and goals that may be different from what other voters have, Capehart noted, with a focus on party mechanisms and structures.
Townsend said that the last election “really illuminated for me is that there is a lack of real understanding of the party processes and the protocols and how it works. It has prompted a number of individuals within the Democratic party, particularly the members, about how they carry their business.”
Psaki recalled another period where the party was in an “existential” moment: 2005, when George W. Bush had narrowly won reelection and it looked as if the GOP was realizing dreams of a generational majority.
Psaki had been deputy press secretary on John Kerry’s presidential campaign and recalls having “$23 in my back account … and then every Democrat was looking for a job.”
In the DNC race back then, Howard Dean was selected as the next party chair. In the midterms, Democrats routed the GOP and won control of Congress, and two years later Barack Obama was elected to the White House.
“I think it’s such a good example,” Psaki said. “I lived it. We all did in different ways, because it kind of means the world is not always as you predict it.”
