Hillary turns down invite to secretive donor meeting
Some feel the club is too closely aligned with the Democratic Party.
By Kenneth P. Vogel and Tarini Parti
| 3/23/15 5:38 AM EDT
| Updated 3/23/15 10:52 AM EDT
An influential coalition of the biggest liberal donors is quietly distancing itself from the national Democratic Party and planning to push its leaders — including Hillary Clinton — to the left.
The Democracy Alliance funders club at a private April gathering in San Francisco is set to unveil a five-year plan to boost causes on which some of its members contend leading Democrats like Clinton have been insufficiently aggressive.
Some within the club’s ranks had felt that it aligned too closely to the Democratic Party during President Barack Obama’s campaigns and administration. And the plan, called 2020 Vision, represents a more assertively liberal direction for Democracy Alliance — one that could pose problems for Clinton in her expected presidential campaign and beyond, if she wins the White House.
It aims to steer more than $30 million a year toward groups committed to fighting income inequality, climate change and the influence of political money. A particular focus is on groups fighting those issues at the state level, reflecting a sense among donors that national political gridlock limits chances for progress on their issues, regardless of the specific candidates.
“The Democracy Alliance donors, as I read them, while they are almost all Democrats and they are electorally active, want to be a progressive force independent from the Democratic Party,” said the group’s president, Gara LaMarche. “That’s not about Hillary Clinton as such, or about Barack Obama as such. It’s about standing for certain core concerns on the economy and climate and pushing that in the states.”
LaMarche wouldn’t comment on plan specifics, expected to be completed in early April, except to say that it reflects broad “alignment” among progressive donors on “key economic issues and climate change.”
But other sources with knowledge of the plan characterize it as more aligned with Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, the dream presidential candidate for many Democracy Alliance members, than with Clinton, the leading Democratic presidential candidate. And for some liberals, it foreshadows an emerging rift that could hamper efforts up and down the ballot in 2016, and possibly lay the groundwork for a liberal version of the tea party, resulting in years of factionalism.
Sources say the club invited former Secretary of State Clinton to speak behind closed doors at the San Francisco meeting, which runs April 12-15 at the Four Seasons hotel. She declined, citing a scheduling conflict — perhaps not surprising, given that she’s expected to launch her presidential campaign around that time. Sources say the group might ask her to record a video message, but Clinton’s office had no knowledge of such plans.
Clinton and her backers have had a sometimes uneasy relationship with the Democracy Alliance. Bill Clinton clashed with a donor named Guy Saperstein at a 2006 conference while defending his wife’s vote to authorize the Iraq War, and club members provided early support to Obama during his epic 2008 battle with her for the Democratic presidential nomination. More recently, Warren got rock star receptions in Democracy Alliance appearances in 2013 and 2014, when she was urged to seek the party’s 2016 nomination.
Hillary Clinton has never addressed the group, which has hosted numerous other high-profile Democrats, including multiple visits by Warren, Vice President Joe Biden and House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi.
“Hillary did not fare well in the Democracy Alliance eight years ago, and I don’t think there is going to be much more support for her this time, other than people thinking that she is the horse we’ve got, so we better not criticize her because it could weaken her,” said Saperstein. A part owner of the Oakland A’s who last year pledged $1 million to a super PAC seeking to draft Warren into the presidential race, Saperstein dropped out of the Democracy Alliance in 2008 but remains friendly with current members; he said there are many who have “great attraction” to Warren.
Clinton might have been an uncomfortable fit at the San Francisco meeting because it would highlight issues on which her centrist sensibilities clash with the Alliance’s more liberal views.
George Soros is one of the DA's biggest-giving partners and has committed to Clinton in 2016. | Getty
For instance, according to a draft agenda obtained by POLITICO, the meeting will feature sessions on reducing the influence of big money politics and reforming the criminal justice system, including ending the death penalty. Clinton, an unparalleled fundraiser, hasn’t led the charge on campaign finance reforms and supports capital punishment — unlike potential 2016 Democratic presidential rival Martin O’Malley. The former Maryland governor, who oversaw the death penalty’s abolition in his state, was invited to speak, but an O’Malley spokeswoman confirmed he is not planning to attend.
Other sessions highlighting assertively liberal stances are titled “Connecting Climate, Education, and Economic Justice” and “Marijuana Politics: Times They are a-Changin’.” The latter session includes a tour of San Francisco’s premier cannabis dispensary, “to learn about the rapidly changing world of medical marijuana” and stimulate discussion “about the role marijuana now plays in American politics,” including how the issue “could help turn key races in 2016 and beyond,” the agenda says.
The death penalty and marijuana sessions were initiated by Democracy Alliance partners — as its member donors are called.
Marsha Rosenbaum, leader of the dispensary tour, praised LaMarche, who launched plans for 2020 Vision when he assumed leadership in 2013, for “an openness to a range of topics and points of view.”
David desJardins, a DA board member who — like Rosenbaum — supported Obama over Clinton in 2008, said he has “not decided” which candidate to support, but suggested that liberal donors and interest groups could influence Clinton’s agenda.
“There is a need to have a menu — like saying, ‘Here are some good policies that would help you actually win and govern.’ And, if outside groups do a good job of that, she’s likely to adopt them,” said desJardins, who was among the first employees at Google. “I want whoever comes out of the Democratic primary to be the best candidate they can be, so to me that means encouraging Hillary to run the best campaign as opposed to hoping that she runs a bad campaign or self-destructs. I wouldn’t want that.”
The DA, as it is known in liberal finance circles, was created in 2005 by a handful of major donors including billionaire financier George Soros and Taco Bell heir Rob McKay. They spent tens of millions of dollars in 2004 in a failed effort to oust President George W. Bush, and the DA was intended to shift major donor giving away from elections and toward a sustained investment in think tanks, media and organizing and data outfits that eventually would win the battle of ideas.
It was patterned on a model its founders believed had been effectively deployed for decades by a few dozen wealthy conservative families, including the Kochs, the Scaifes and the Coorses.
Read more:
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/democracy-alliance-wants-to-push-hillary-clinton-to-the-left-116275.html#ixzz3VFxo69qd
