How Kamala Harris’ campaign burned through more than $1.4 billion in 15 weeks dominated the storyline of vice president’s devastating loss to Donald Trump on Nov. 5.
While there are questions that only the campaign itself can answer, the four people running to be the next Democratic National Committee chair say they want to find out as much as they’re able about an election where Democrats had more money and manpower in 2024 but lost the White House anyway.
In interviews, the candidates for DNC chair told NBC News that as the party moves into 2025, it should be armed with a post-mortem to learn lessons from an election in which the Democratic presidential candidate lost every battleground state and the popular vote.
The DNC would not have the power to do a forensic examination into the Harris campaign spending, as it is a separate entity, but the candidates each said they supported a broad review of what happened leading up to the White House loss, including looking at messaging, voter outreach and how resources were dispensed.
Ken Martin, Minnesota Party chair and a DNC vice chair, said the party needs a sweeping review of how it’s approaching the electorate. He called for a third-party audit of the entire party infrastructure, including the DNC and its sister committees that fight for Democratic gains in Congress.
“I think you’re looking at everything, it’s not just contracts and consultants, it’s not just ad spends and media buys, it’s A through Z,” Martin said.
While Martin took particular aim at consultants, saying they “need to go,” he said he was not referencing the Harris campaign.
“This is not a commentary on any one specific campaign,” Martin said. “It is a commentary on the culture of Washington D.C.”
Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler said the party is best armed to win future elections by diving into 2024 data.
“It’s important for us to learn every lesson we can about what just took place, and that’s ecosystem-wide,” Wikler said. “It’s about reckoning with what works, what didn’t, what we can learn, how we can win as many elections as we can — and stretch every resource as far as we can — in the years to come. Learning from what just took place is a good way to do that.”
Wikler is also urging the party to look at alternate ways of communicating to voters, including appearing on shows that traditionally cater to conservative audiences as well as building out progressive news spaces “free of right-wing propaganda.”
Wikler and Martin, as well as former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley and New York state senator James Skoufis have announced they are vying for DNC chair, an election that will take place Feb. 1.
It’s unclear what kind of impact any kind of post-mortem would have. After Mitt Romney lost the presidential contest in 2012, Reince Priebus famously led a Republican “autopsy” to better understand what went wrong. Among the conclusions was the party was too old and needed better messaging on immigrants. Then, Trump won in 2016, blowing up many of the report’s assertions.
On Thursday, the DNC Rules and Bylaws committee will meet to hash out some of the details of the election. Democrats will hold four public forums throughout January for the candidates.
The election comes as President Joe Biden is leaving office, and his hand-picked DNC chair, Jaime Harrison, announced he is stepping down. When Republicans control the White House, the DNC chair role becomes an open contest and that person wields far more power than they do when a Democrat is president.
Biden granted his campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon vast political control, leading to plenty of consternation within the DNC and in some corners of the campaign over what critics described as a top-down approach in decision-making. Harrison wielded little power at that time — something that some DNC officials said should change moving forward.
“Regardless of whether you have the White House or not, you can’t shelve the chair or the chair’s voice in this process,” a DNC official complained in an interview of the 2024 campaign. “This should be the last cycle that this happens.”
How Democrats used their vast resources has come under particular scrutiny after Harris’ presidential campaign raised — and spent — a stunning $1.4 billion in 107 days. The pace rattled supporters, donors and even some on the campaign, who complained of lavish spending on celebrities and ongoing appeals for money even after losing the election.
“There needs to be a full review, a full and formal evaluation of this last cycle — the good, the bad and the ugly,” Skoufis said. “Certainly as part of that broader review, I very strongly believe we should be looking at that partnership … between the DNC and the Harris campaign. Was it effective? And yes, was the money spent appropriately, not just on the DNC side, but also within the presidential campaign?”
O’Malley called for an “after-action report” about what worked and what didn’t for the party’s strategy in 2024, but stopped short of calling for a forensic audit of the DNC or Harris campaign, noting they are separate entities.
“We need a dispassionate after-action to learn what worked and what didn’t,” O’Malley said. “I refuse to call it an autopsy.”
“Openness and transparency is the opening ante in building trust. … In order to rebuild trust with people who gave generously, time and again.”