After rough election, state Democrats vote on leaders

Soul-searching among Minnesota Democrats still smarting from November losses culminates Saturday with a contested race Saturday for DFL Party leader.

This weekend, DFLers will choose whether to stick with current party chair Ken Martin, or choose a new direction at a meeting in Hinckley, Minn.

Martin, who seeks a fourth term, is being challenged by Donna Cassutt, who was the party's associate chair from 2005 to 2011. Terms as party chair are two years long.

The DFL held its ground in the presidential race and didn't surrender any of its five seats in Congress. Yet, the party lost significant ground in the Legislature, with Republicans now in charge of both chambers.

Martin said some of it was outside the party's control in a turbulent campaign season upended by Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.

"When you win elections everyone thinks you're a genius so they have a tendency to gloss over the mistakes you make," Martin said. "When you lose elections they think you're an idiot and they have a tendency to forget all the good things. In both cases, there's things you did well and things you need to improve upon."

Martin has the support of Gov. Mark Dayton, U.S. Sens. Al Franken and Amy Klobuchar and other party stalwarts. He was elected last week to be president of the American Association of State Democratic Party Chairs. He has led the Minnesota DFL since 2011.

"I always say you can't always judge someone by wins and losses. You have to judge by the organization and whether or not we did our part," Martin said. "We did our part."

Cassutt, a community organizer whose time in party leadership didn't overlap with Martin's tenure, said the DFL needs rebuilding and revitalizing.

She said the party also must do a better job communicating to voters.

"We need to get back to listening to the voters, hearing what their concerns are, doing some year-round organizing, showing up in different ways and living our values and recruiting and supporting local candidates," she said.

Some DFLers in elective office took issue this week with party strategy in an open letter to party leaders.

In it, they wrote that the party has relied too heavily on data lists that try to predict voter preferences, which can prove faulty or leave possible pools of support for DFL candidates untouched. "We believe much of the blame for those losses comes from a counter-productive campaign strategy," the current and former legislators wrote. "The DFL's extensive financial and volunteer resources were not used wisely."

Their letter didn't advocate for one chair candidate over the other.

But Cassutt said she has the support of Democrats who want the party to rethink strategy, whether they were behind Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders in a fractious presidential primary.

"There seems to be a good amount of consensus that we have to repair the breech with the people who've lost trust in the Minnesota DFL," Cassutt said. "A lot of folks are open to — both Hillary and Bernie supporters — new leadership."

Members of the DFL state central committee will also elect a vice chair, outreach officer, secretary and treasurer during the Saturday meeting.