What's Wrong With The DCCC? How Do You Count The Ways? Let's Begin With Kyrsten Sinema

A few days ago, a major DCCC contributor, Blake Byrne, realized he's been had. Over the years, Byrne has contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars on nauseating conservative congressional candidates that the DCCC has assured him share his values as well as to the DCCC (and the DSCC and DNC). After he recognized so many of the conservatives he'd been tricked into donating to had voted against the Syrian refugees, he closed his checkbook to the DCCC, hopefully forever-- or until they do a real and thorough house-cleaning and get all the Rahm Emanuel/Chris Van Hollen/Steve Israel garbage out of there. Byrne wrote to some of the sickening and cowardly conservatives he'd been tricked into helping bankroll through his DCCC contributions-- like Scott Peters, Kyrsten Sinema, Sean Patrick Maloney, Steve Israel and Julia Brownley-- and told them, "What a disappointment you are to me and all the others who fight for equal rights for our fellow Americans! I too want a majority of Democrats in the House of Representatives, but not people who use others hardships as their stepping stones. I know you’re in a very competitive district, but reelection at the expense of the Syrian refugees is not worth reelection."

In the last few years, beyond his generous contributions directly to their candidates, he's written just over a dozen checks to the DCCC alone-- totaling $275,000. Among the wretched candidates the DCCC steered him to are revolting conservatives like Patricl Murphy (New Dem-FL), Pete Aguilar (New Dem-CA), Sean Patrick Maloney (New Dem-NY), Loretta Sanchez (Blue Dog-CA), Jane Harman (New Dem-CA), Kathleen Hochul (Blue Dog-NY), Brad Schneider (New Dem-IL), Ann Kirkpatrick (New Dem-AZ)... many of the worst Democrats in Congress (i.e., the Steve Israel Dems).

Last week, the DCCC announced that they had outraised their GOP counterpart, the NRCC, in October, $5.4 million to $5.1 million-- and so far this cycle, $56.9 million to $50.9 million. How do they spend all that loot-- and still manage to lose so consistently?

Well, I've tried explaining how the corruption inside the DCCC funnels donors' money into the pockets of the crooks who work there. But a lot of the catastrophe that defines the DCCC has to do with how they decide to spend their money. Most money earmarked for races goes to incumbents on their Frontline list. These are the Members so far this cycle:

• Rep. Kyrsten Sinema (Blue Dog-AZ)- 51%
• Rep. Ami Bera (New Dem-CA)- 51%
• Rep. Julia Brownley (CA)- 54%
• Rep. Pete Aguilar (New Dem-CA)- 57%
• Rep. Raul Ruiz (CA)- 51%
• Rep. Scott Peters (New Dem-CA)- 52%
• Rep. Gwen Graham (Blue Dog-FL)- 47%
• Rep. Cheri Bustos (Blue Dog-IL)- 57%
• Rep. Rick Nolan (MN)- 52%
• Rep. Brad Ashford (Blue Dog-NE)- 46%
• Rep. Annie Kuster (New Dem-NH)- 54%
• Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (New Dem-NY)- 51%

There's exactly one decent Democrat on the entire list, Rick Nolan. The percentage next to each name is how much of the vote Obama got in their district in 2012. Of the dozen districts, Obama won all but 2. And some by very wide margins, like in Cheri Bustos' district and Pete Aguilar's district. But all these Democrats, except Nolan, have such conservative voting records-- and vote so frequently against progressive ideas and with the GOP-- they they have a hard time with grassroots Democrats in their districts. Many, like Sinema, Aguilar and Maloney are hated by the activists in their districts. Last year this is how much the DCCC and Nancy Pelosi's related House Majority PAC spent on each of these miserable conservatives' election campaigns:

• Rep. Kyrsten Sinema- $696,408
• Rep. Ami Bera- $5,857,853
• Rep. Julia Brownley- $2,022,152
• Rep. Pete Aguilar- $1,465,598
• Rep. Raul Ruiz- $202,235
• Rep. Scott Peters- $3,399,795
• Rep. Gwen Graham- $3,594,956
• Rep. Cheri Bustos- $1,267,369
• Rep. Rick Nolan- $6,229,257
• Rep. Brad Ashford- $1,522,408
• Rep. Annie Kuster- $4,134,157
• Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney- $2,143,862

If you contribute to the DCCC the biggest portion of your money that doesn't get eaten up by endemic corruption, goes to ultra-conservative candidates with whom you probably share very few values. Most of these candidates didn't just vote against the Syrian refugees; they are also actively working with the Republicans and Wall Street lobbyists to gut significant portions of Dodd Frank consumer financial protection bill. In his concise piece last week about the Democrats working to block new regulations while taking a flood of campaign cash from the banksters, Andrew Perez, writing for the International Business Times, singled out Arizona Blue Dog Kyrsten Sinema as one of the most venal and corrupt Members of Congress.

A Democrat in a competitive district, Sinema sits on the House Financial Services Committee-- known as a “money committee,” where members regularly raise large sums with ease. She has pulled in roughly $895,000 [now up to $905,071] from the financial industry since 2012 and has been a reliable vote for Wall Street interests.

Early this year, Republicans sought to jam through pro-Wall Street legislation combining the texts from 11 deregulatory bills. While the initial effort failed, it passed the House on a second try. On both attempts, Republicans had Sinema’s support.

Sinema has backed Republicans’ efforts to remove new mortgage rules issued by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), the regulatory agency created by the Dodd-Frank law. She co-sponsored a bill in April to kill borrower protections for mobile-home loans [one of only 4 corrupt conservative Dems to do so], just weeks after the Center for Public Integrity exposed the abuses those borrowers face. That same month, Sinema co-sponsored a bill to block the CFPB from trying to stop discrimination by auto lenders, even though some lenders have settled with the agency for charging minorities extra fees.

If you want to contribute to progressive candidates for Congress who aren't like Kyrsten Sinema or the other conservative hacks Steve Israel recruits, you can find them here, on this page Or, just click on the thermometer.