DNC Chair Thought David Hogg’s Departure Would End His Woes, But Another Shoe Just Dropped
Among those dissatisfied with Hogg’s departure and Martin’s leadership are Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, and Lee Saunders, president of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees.
Politico recently obtained a two-minute recording from a May 15 Zoom meeting of Democratic National Committee officers. During the call, Committee Chair Ken Martin, who was very emotional at the time, expressed doubts about his ability to continue on in his leadership role due to the “infighting” created by then-Vice Chair David Hogg. I wrote about this story here.
Hogg, you may recall, has vowed to spend $20 million via his super PAC, Leaders We Deserve, to primary Democrats in safe seats with younger, and, in his opinion, more effective candidates. While there may be wisdom in Hogg’s idea, according to Politico, it has “ignited a firestorm in the party.”
The chair of the DNC said he doesn’t want to do his job anymore https://t.co/wnIUhGVxM1 pic.twitter.com/menlHXhoT5
— Andrew Kaczynski (@KFILE) June 8, 2025
Shortly after the audio from the call was leaked, the DNC voted to hold new elections. Hogg announced he would not seek to reclaim his former role as vice chair.
Among those dissatisfied with Hogg’s departure and Martin’s leadership are Randi Weingarten, president of the 1.8-million-member American Federation of Teachers, and Lee Saunders, president of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, which represents approximately 1.4 million workers.
Their dissatisfaction ran so deep that both have severed long-standing ties with the DNC. In a letter to Martin dated June 5 and received on Sunday, Weingarten informed him she was declining his offer to be reappointed to the Committee.
She wrote, “While I am proud to be a Democrat, I appear to be out of step with the leadership you are forging, and I do not want to be the one who keeps questioning why we are not enlarging our tent.”
New: AFT President Randi Weingarten is leaving the DNC.
In a letter to DNC Chair Ken Martin, she wrote, "I appear to be out of step with the leadership you are forging, and I do not want to be the one who keeps questioning why we are not enlarging our tent." pic.twitter.com/s1ikflANjK
— Holly Otterbein (@hollyotterbein) June 15, 2025
The New York Times reported that Saunders had written a similar letter of resignation to Martin on May 27. The Times reached out to Saunders for a comment on his decision, and he replied with the following statement:
The decision to decline the nomination to the Democratic National Committee was not made lightly. It comes after deep reflection and deliberate conversation about the path forward for our union and the working people we represent.
These are new times. They demand new strategies, new thinking and a renewed way of fighting for the values we hold dear. We must evolve to meet the urgency of this moment. This is not a time to close ranks or turn inward. The values we stand for, and the issues we fight for, benefit all working people. It is our responsibility to open the gates, welcome others in and build the future we all deserve together.
[Given their positions as union leaders, many are questioning why Weingarten or Saunders were involved with the DNC at all—but I digress.]
As the Times sees it, their departures “represent a significant erosion of trust” in both the DNC and in Martin’s ability to lead the party out of its current disarray. The article noted that in their respective resignation letters, both union bosses “suggested that under Mr. Martin’s leadership, the DNC was failing to expand its coalition.”
According to the Times, neither Weingarten nor Saunders supported Martin in the DNC chairmanship race earlier this year. Instead, they backed his opponent, Ben Wikler, chair of the Wisconsin Democratic Party. After securing the position, Martin removed Weingarten from the DNC’s powerful Rules and Bylaws Committee, which oversees the calendar and procedures for the party’s presidential nominating process.
From there, the situation continued to unravel.
And if Martin thought Hogg’s exit was the end of his problems, he was sorely mistaken.
Elizabeth writes commentary for Legal Insurrection and The Washington Examiner. She is an academy fellow at The Heritage Foundation. Please follow Elizabeth on LinkedIn or X.
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Comments
Last time I saw an enlarged tent like DNC’s, it housed the freak show at the state fair.
It’s s YUGE tent but divided into 1 million sections, one for each possible identity group.
World’s biggest enlarged prostate.
Notice how sanity is not part of the equation
I’m trying hard, really hard, to be depressed over this. No success so far.
.
If a communist leaves the demonrats while in a forest, does anyone care?
Randi Weingarten plays an important role in my life. Every March I tape her photo on the fridge door to lose 20 pounds for cycling season.
I’m going to make more popcorn
Have they forgotten the events of the past few weeks? There are kings in this country! Something must be done!
I recommend getting together with illegals to hold protests in the streets. Tell them to wave Mexican flags, burn US flags and throw rocks at the police. Maybe burn a few cars. That will show the DNC has proper leadership and more people will support your party.
This is a pass the popcorn kind of moment. I don’t like David Hogg one bit, but yes he was correct that leadership is needed. However his idea of new leadership likely is cloning Ilhan Omar over and over again. So new blood likely means finding more extremists and making the DNC even less accessible and likeable. There are no new ideas out there. No kings might as well be Occupy Wall street for all its clueless insanity. DNC is still hopelessly stuck on being against some boogeyman, Trump, versus actually standing for anything. They are forgetting that the majority of the country approves of their boogeyman, or possibly they just learned math in a US public school with Weingarten approved COVID virtual curriculum?
What the democrats deserve no decent human being should have to be around.
Weren’t the leaders that various Democrats deserve described in detail by Dante?
That would probably be the current and future inhabitants of the 4th (Greed), 8th (Fraud), and 9th (Treachery) circles of Hell. (Note: I fudged a bit and had to revisit my source material.)
Even when I am 100% certain I remember correctly I look stuff up before I post it. It is so easy to do now. On the occasions where I find out I was wrong on a detail I am glad to post the correct information rather than add to the bad information on the internet.
While I have long given up on the idea that there is a political solution to our biggest woes in this country, there’s no denying that the DNC is a wholly unserious organization and that a change of leadership has been long overdue. I truly didn’t think Hogg would see any support given how comfortable the big earners at the DNC are, but it would seem everyone has their limits and are taking their loss last year more seriously.
It is right to primary useless dems using their position to enrich themselves and ignore their constituents. But most importantly they need replacements that are respectable and closer to moderate. We don’t need woke foot soldiers to replace the parasitic class. But they need SOMEBODY
The fun part is Randi Weingarten backing up Hogg’s Youth Corps.
“Bring him back! I’m not that old!”
the dnc is not even sure which bathroom to use
I wonder how many people hearing this announcement would find it troubling to learn that the head of AFT Union was openly a DNC board member? Not the news junkie folks that comment here but average folks who might be less aware?
Let’s say I am surprised, but not astounded.
Not enough would find it troubling.
We all should thank David Hogg for the fact that if he wasn’t a secret Republican doing mismanagement on purpose he might as well have been.
Why is a union president sitting on a the political board of one of the two major parties? It’s never spelled out what direction she wants the DNC to go but I bet it’s not to moderate, it’s to go along with Hogg’s attempt to overthrow the power brokers in the party and take it over. How the AFT keeps electing this crank to lead them is a mystery.
Let’s see, the leaders of the American Federation of Teachers (ATF) and the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees; both were powerful members of the DNC. So all government workers (all levels) and the Public Schools were headed by Democrat ‘Politburo’ members.
So it was all about money laundering, as in the Public Unions are an appendage of the Democrat Party and they get the Democrats to raise whatever taxes it takes to meet their demands. It’s like the situation in Chicago – but nation wide. I do recall that FDR was actually very much opposed to Government Workers Unions – seriously opposed.
So it must have been Truman or I guess Kennedy that let these ‘camels’ get there noses under the tent so to speak. And Randi Weingarten is not even a teacher, never was – she is a lawyer. It’s just so sweet. I have no words to describe my utter disgust. Oh well – what else to expect in the insane world we live in today. Let’s see, the Democrats have gone all ‘1984’ on us. Violent is Peaceful, and Peaceful is Violent.. Knowledge is Ignorance, and Ignorance is Knowledge. Yep – about right.
As MAGA took over the Republican Party so Hogg’s MADA (Make America Democrat Again) is now taking over the Democrat Party.
The entire DNC is nothing but a losing clown show.
Sun Tzu: “Never interrupt your opponent while he is in the middle of making a mistake.”
The Republicans should just stand back and smile.
Hogg came for the King, and missed.