Alabama Democratic Party Chairman Randy Kelley released a letter Monday night that he sent to the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, claiming that racism was to blame for his preferred delegates to the party’s convention not being recognized by the national organization.
In the letter, Kelley also claimed that former Senator Doug Jones had orchestrated a plot “to prevent Black people from electing delegates of their choice to the DNC.”
Jones could not immediately be reached for comment.
Jones previously told AL.com that he was not involved in Biden’s original decision to reject a number of delegates, but helped the campaign decide who should serve as alternate delegates.
“The Alabama Democratic Party (ADP) is submitting this petition only because it has no other choice. Its existence and future progress are at stake. This is a case of racism,” Kelley wrote in an Aug. 2 letter to Democratic National Committee Chairman Jamie Harrison, who, like Kelley, is black.
The letter, Kelley wrote, was a challenge to the DNC’s refusal to admit the 36 convention delegates selected by Kelley and other members of the state party’s executive committee.
Efforts to reach the DNC for comment were not immediately successful.
Before President Biden dropped out of the race, his campaign approved a slate of delegates that was significantly different from the state Democratic Party’s slate.
Of the 34 district delegates, the Biden team approved only 13 names.
The campaign also endorsed five of the nine party leaders and elected officials (PLEO) positions on the state party’s slate, two of the 11 at-large delegates and one of four alternate candidates, according to Alabama Democratic Party lists.
The state party was supposed to elect PLEO, at-large and alternate delegates on June 8. However, because the party did not reach a quorum at its meeting that day, the state delegation elected those positions, the DNC said in a statement.
In the event that a delegate was not confirmed, the Biden campaign chose a replacement. The district-level delegates selected by the campaign were placed on the primary ballot and elected in March.
Kelley said he filed the lawsuit because the DNC “enabled private citizens to deny blacks in Alabama the right to vote in the Democratic primary” on March 5.
Kelley was referring to Jones, who he said was one of the Democrats “who don’t want blacks to elect delegates of their choice,” and claimed that Jones had appointed delegates approved by the DNC.
Meanwhile, Harrison Kelley said in a letter this month that the state party had missed the deadline to reject delegates or select its delegates because the party’s executive committee had not reached a quorum.
In the letter, obtained by AL.com, the DNC chairman urged Kelley to “refrain from further miscommunication or misinformation to convention attendees.”
Friction between the Alabama Democratic Party and the national party is nothing new. Five years ago, Jones, then in the Senate and backed by the DNC, joined forces with a faction of the state party to pass new bylaws and replace longtime chairwoman Nancy Worley, a Reed ally. with State Rep. Chris England.
Control resumed in 2022 when the State Democratic Executive Committee elected Kelley as chairman with the support of Reed and the Alabama Democratic Conference.
Kelley was undeterred by Harrison’s letter and released a press release and the text of his challenge to the DNC on Monday evening.
He claimed that the party’s political options in Alabama were being neglected because both the party and the state’s executive committee were predominantly black.
“Alabama demands to be respected and treated rightly – with the same rights and respect you would expect for your state,” Kelley wrote. “Because we have a black chairman and a black majority in the state of Alabama, we still expect to be treated fairly. Alabama has BEAR (emphasis in the original) enough!”
