Democratic Party Chair Announces Resignation on Eve of the Convention

Wasserman Schultz will step down at the end of the DNC in Philadelphia

Brian Cahn/ZUMA Wire

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Democratic National Committee chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz announced Sunday afternoon that she would resign her position following the end of the party’s quadrennial convention this week in Philadelphia.

The Florida congresswoman’s decision came just days after WikiLeaks published a trove of internal DNC emails, including one in which a party official discussed pushing stories about Bernie Sanders’ faith to damage the Vermont senator’s chances in southern states.

The Sanders campaign, and many of his supporters, had long held a grudge against Wasserman Schultz, accusing her and the DNC of favoring former secretary of state Hillary Clinton in various ways throughout the primary. But in her five years at the helm, Wasserman Schultz had often clashed with other party leaders. In 2014, Politico reported that her interactions with President Barack Obama were limited to brief exchanges on the rope-line at fundraising events.

Here’s the full statement:

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AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

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