Politico reports that “long-simmering doubts” and a renewed lack of confidence in Democratic National Committee Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz from the White House, congressional Dems and other Washington Democrats has Schultz struggling to try and hold onto her job.
They’ve lost faith in her as “a unifying leader and reliable party spokesperson” just as we approach a mid-term election that already has Democrats at a disadvantage.
Recently, Wasserman Schultz criticized the White House’s for it’s handling of the immigration crisis and also border crisis and also compared the political right to wife beaters.
The chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee trivialized the plight of domestic violence victims Wednesday by comparing Republican right-to-work policies with wife-beating.
Speaking of Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and his pro-growth economic agenda during a campaign stop in Wisconsin, Florida Rep. Debbie Wasserman Shultz was graphic – and insulting.
“Scott Walker has given women the back of his hand,” Wassermann Schultz said, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “I know that is stark. I know that is direct. But that is reality.”
Clearly the dogs have been loosed in her direction given this comment from a prominent donor.
“I guess the best way to describe it is, it’s not that she’s losing a duel anywhere, it’s that she seems to keep shooting herself in the foot before she even gets the gun out of the holster,” said John Morgan, a major donor in Wasserman Schultz’s home state of Florida.
And the White House doesn’t seem to be holding back, either. At this point it seems fair to speculate that she’s either going to be gone soon, or this is only going to get worse for her, as well as more ugly.
One example that sources point to as particularly troubling: Wasserman Schultz repeatedly trying to get the DNC to cover the costs of her wardrobe.
In 2012, Wasserman Schultz attempted to get the DNC to pay for her clothing at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, multiple sources say, but was blocked by staff in the committee’s Capitol Hill headquarters and at President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign headquarters in Chicago.
She asked again around Obama’s inauguration in 2013, pushing so hard that Obama senior adviser — and one-time Wasserman Schultz booster — Valerie Jarrett had to call her directly to get her to stop. (Jarrett said she does not recall that conversation.) One more time, according to independent sources with direct knowledge of the conversations, she tried again, asking for the DNC to buy clothing for the 2013 White House Correspondents’ Dinner.?
Wasserman Schultz denies that she ever tried to get the DNC to pick up her clothing tab. “I think that would be a totally inappropriate use of DNC funds,” she said in a statement. “I never asked someone to do that for me, I would hope that no one would seek that on my behalf, and I’m not aware that anyone did.”
Tracie Pough, Wasserman Schultz’s chief of staff at the DNC and her congressional office, was also involved in making inquiries about buying the clothing, according to sources. Pough denies making, directing or being aware of any inquiries.
But sources with knowledge of the discussions say Wasserman Schultz’s efforts couldn’t have been clearer. “She felt firmly that it should happen,” said a then-DNC staffer of the clothing request. “Even after it was explained that it couldn’t, she remained indignant.”