Cheri Bustos Stokes An Anti-Progressive Civil War Inside The Democratic Party

The Republican wing of the Democratic Party

House Democrats have a long, ugly history of choosing the worst among them as their leaders. The excuse has always been that the best among them have been too busy working on policy to get into the money-chase and grubby bare-knuckle politics that Democrats have used to assess leadership ability. When minority whip Nancy Pelosi stood up to right-of-center corporate whore minority leader Dick Gephardt and persuaded a majority of Democrats to oppose his cooperation with Bush in launching the Iraq War, it looked like a great change was coming. Unfortunately the change was in Pelosi, not in the quality of congressional leadership.

Thank God, Pelosi's designated heir, Joe Crowley-- a New York sewer pol-- had his career ended by a young lady bartender from the Bronx in 2018. An even greater catastrophe for House Democrats was averted when Obama pulled Rahm Emanuel out of House leadership (for White House service, where he did plenty of damage). Now one of the contenders to succeed Pelosi is an Emanuel protégée, Cheri Bustos (D-IL). Like Emanuel once was, she heads the DCCC, a job she gave up her membership in the Blue Dog caucus for-- although she's still a member of the New Dems... and certainly hasn't stopped voting alongside the Blue Dogs. Progressive Punch rates her a very solid "F" and her voting record is the furthest right of any of Illinois' 13 Democrats-- worse than Brad Schneider (Blue Dog), worse than Dan Lipinski (Blue Dog) and worse than Bill Foster (New Dem), the 3 most conservative shitheads-- other than Bustos-- in the Illinois delegation.

Last week, she used an old Rahm Emanuel trick to block her Democratic primary opponent, Spanky Edwards, president of the Peoria Chapter of the ACLU and the chairman of the Youth Works Committee of the Illinois NAACP, preventing him from getting on the ballot. While Bustos was busy trying to undermine progressives nationwide-- undercutting campaigns for Morgan Harper, Marie Newman, Jessica Cisneros, Rachel Ventura-- she used Rockford alderman William Rose-- a member of her shady political machine, the so-called Build a Bench Program-- as the official objector to Edwards' petitions. Chicago hired gun Amy Zimmerman, was the lawyer who had him kicked off the ballot for Bustos by, in effect, challenging the right of poor people to participate in elections. But that's what Republicans do, not Democrats, right? Well... depends how you define "Democrats." (Now Edwards is running as a write-in candidate and challenging the very corrupt petition process. "A resident of the district ," he said the other day, "should be able to sign a petition regardless if they're registered at their current address. Poor people have a high mobility rate, we move often. This makes no sense because people can register and vote at the same time.")

On Friday, Politico establishment stenographer Ally Mutnick wrote up a DCCC press gaggle with Bustos and her new executive director, Lucinda Guinn, from the previous day, giving her an opportunity to brag about big fundraising numbers and a chance to lay out the House battleground plans. Mutnick's reporting is always an opportunity to see what the DCCC is thinking. She reported, for example, that shitty conservative candidates-- Gina Ortiz Jones (TX-23), Betsy Dirksen Londrigan (IL-13) and Dan Feehan (MN-01)-- in key pickup districts are top priorities while outstanding progressives in key pickup districts-- Kara Eastman (NE-02) and Dana Balter (NY-24) are "less formidable." Imagine if Politico ever considered hiring someone with a brain to cover politics, instead of someone to parrot DCCC and NRCC bullshit.

Bustos also dished on committee efforts to help members in tough primaries. DCCC officials sat down with Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-OH), who Bustos said is “facing the toughest race she’s faced since she was first elected in 2012,” to offer advice and resumes for potential campaign staff. (Beatty was outraised in Q3 by challenger Morgan Harper.) When pressed, Bustos and Guinn declined to rule out field or ad expenditures for other members in primary battles, like Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-IL) and Henry Cuellar (D-TX), but they didn’t sound enthusiastic about the prospect. “Look, we’ve got to hang on to the majority, and we have 42 Frontliners. That is our priority,” Bustos said.

Several progressive icons within the Democratic House caucus-- including Jan Schakowsky (IL), AOC (NY), Ro Khanna (CA) and Pramila Jayapal (WA) have begun endorsing progressives in primaries, progressives who Bustos and her slime ball team-- many Bustos people were recently fired for being caught out in overt racism and homophobia; she's wasn't fired but was supposed to attend psychiatric counseling instead-- are working furiously to undermine.

There was a big hubbub this week because the DCCC has been whining all over town that AOC raises immense amounts of money-- way more than hated figures on the party's far right fringe like Bustos-- but that she won't hand any of it over to the DCCC (so that Bustos can use it to destroy the progressive candidates AOC backs). She's donating money directly to candidates who stand for Democratic values and principles, not the Bustos candidates who are virtually all next in line to mimic Jeff Van Drew and pledge fealty to Trumpism. Congress' 3 top money-raisers for 2019:

• Schiff- $4,377,168
• Pelosi- $3,717,762
• AOC- $3,354,732

One of the worst of the anti-AOC scumbags always happy to push the DCCC further right is personification of corruption, bribe cultivating New Dem Gregory Meeks, Queens Democratic Party machine boss-- he took over when AOC beat Crowley. He went to Fox News to say, "Sometimes the question comes: 'Do you want to be in a majority or do you want to be in the minority?' And do you want to be part of a team?" Who would want to be on a team with Meeks, who is likely to wind up in prison some day soon? The progressive candidate running against him, a former AOC campaign staffer, is Shaniyat Chowdhury. Please consider contributing to his campaign by clicking on the 2020 Primary A Blue Dog thermometer on the right.

Although Fox News refused to identify another potential Jeff Van Drew who whispered his anti-AOC poison to Fox, everyone knows it was Oregon conservative Blue Dog Kurt Schrader, who is facing a tough primary from Milwaukie mayor Mark Gamba.

Another Democrat was less diplomatic: “Deadbeat Cortez should pay her bills,” complained the Democratic source. “She’s always whining about people paying their fair share and here she is leaving her friends with the bill.”

Their gripe is that Ocasio-Cortez hasn’t given any money to the DCCC, the party arm with the sole job of electing Democrats to the House. Records obtained by Fox News show the New York Democrat has failed to pay any of her $250,000 in “dues” to the DCCC.

Her goose egg of a contribution is no accident. Ocasio-Cortez says she has beef with the DCCC and she'll withhold her money in protest of how the Democratic Party won't back insurgent progressive primary candidates, like herself, in the name of protecting incumbents.

“For me personally, I’m not paying D-trip dues,” said Ocasio-Cortez, using slang for the DCCC and citing a “myriad of reasons.”

“One, I don’t agree with the policy around blacklisting groups that help progressive candidates,” she said, referring to a DCCC effort to sideline vendors who assist challengers to members of Congress. “I think we need to evolve as a party and make room for that.”

Instead, Ocasio-Cortez is ramping up her donor base with the help of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) whom she endorsed for president in October, to funnel money directly to progressive candidates.

Through social media posts and email solicitations, she's activated her donor network to support her hand-picked candidates. In 2019 alone, she funneled more than $300,000 to candidates she’s endorsed by hosting online fundraising campaigns for them, according to records obtained by Fox News.

“I want to help frontline members by putting that money straight into their pocket,” Ocasio-Cortez said.

Bucking the Democratic Party line, Ocasio-Cortez led online fundraisers for at least two progressives who are trying to defeat sitting Democratic members of Congress.

She solicited nearly $18,000 in donations for Marie Newman, who is taking on current Illinois Rep. Dan Lipinski, a conservative Democrat who opposes abortion. She also gave Newman an additional $5,000 directly from her campaign account. Ocasio-Cortez also raised nearly $35,000 in online donations for progressive challenger Jessica Cisneros, who is trying to defeat Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX).

“Certainly, these are new times,” Cuellar said of his colleague's effort to oust him,  “which is something that we certainly don't agree with.”

Cuellar said Democrats should be focused on the larger goal of beating Republicans and retaining the House majority. “To have people try to purify the caucus because they don't agree with them-- 100 percent, I certainly don't agree with that.”

“Hopefully, we will start to get away from this circular firing squad," said Cuellar, who paid all his dues to the DCCC, records show.

Ocasio-Cortez views herself as a vehicle to help candidates who wouldn’t ordinarily have access to DCCC resources and “to really bring in people from outside the traditional political process,” she said.

Yesterday, AOC announced the formation of her new leadership PAC: Courage to Change. "When community leaders, activists, and working-class candidates try to run for office," she wrote, "organizations like the DCCC discourage them. These potential progressive leaders are asked: 'Can you raise $300,000 from your friends and family? If not, don’t bother trying.' ... [D]oes that surprise you? When you think about how broken Washington is-- and so many of our representatives are wealthy elites-- it makes sense... As we speak, the DCCC still blacklists all progressives running against incumbents. It doesn’t matter to them if those incumbents support Trump, vote for a regime of deportation, ask the Supreme Court to allow bans on abortion, or stand with the NRA. That’s the DCCC’s choice. And this is ours-- we will not support candidates who do not reflect the values of the Democratic party. And together, we will fight to elect people who will stand up for the nation we all deserve."

Cheri Bustos is working towards becoming the next Speaker of the House. She and her allies are ingratiating themselves with the right-of-center members who they expect to help elect her. Just think about that, the way Debbie Wasserman Schultz appears to be in the photo of the two of them below.