(JNi.media) This might be the moment in Democratic party history which future scholars would point to in explaining why a Republican was elected president in 2016. It began with a rancorous battle between the president and a leading senator, those scholars might note, a battle that swept the entire party in its wake.
A source close to NY Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer told Politico that the senator is blaming President Obama for leaking Schumer’s decision to oppose the Iran deal, which he revealed to the president in a private phone call Thursday afternoon.
Apparently, Schumer specifically asked the president to give him until Friday to announce his decision. According to the source, Obama was the only person Schumer told of his decision before the story got leaked to the press.
Schumer’s people are saying now that Obama’s people violated a private agreement and leaked the news out when they figured it would get as little attention as possible, right around the time of the Republican debate on Fox News.
Apparently, the White House is easily as hurt as Schumer is by the recent dispute with the leading Democrat. White House press secretary Josh Earnest on Friday stopped just short of promising that his boss would retaliate in the harshest possible way, namely derail Schumer’s appointment to lead the Senate Democrats when Sen. Harry Reid retires in 2016.
“I wouldn’t be surprised” Earnest said, about the suggestion that Senate Democrats would remember Schumer’s vote on Iran, and embarrassing a sitting Democratic president, when picking their next leader. On the possibility that Schumer’s leadership is now in doubt, Earnest insisted that “this is a question for Democratic senators.”
Which is not what you would call an endorsement.
Then Earnest added that “there’s no denying that this difference of opinion that emerged overnight is one that has existed between Senator Schumer and President Obama for over a decade.”
The resentment the White House harbors towards Schumer is not so much that he is against the Iran deal — they wouldn’t have begrudged him that, seeing as he is a Jewish senator from Flatbush Avenue, Brooklyn. They’re angry because Schumer should have considered his senior position in publicizing his objection so far ahead of the vote on the deal.
With so many undecided in both houses, letting everyone know he’s against it is tantamount to campaigning for the Republican side, in Washington’s highly adversarial political environment.
This is the second dispute between the Obama folks and Chuck Schumer, the first one being the president’s other defining legislation: Obamacare.
“Chuck Schumer, who said it was a mistake to pass Obamacare, now comes out against the Iran Deal. This is our next Senate leader?” Obama’s former Director of Speechwriting Jon Favreau tweeted Thursday night.
MoveOn.org has announced what amounts to nothing short of fratricide—a donor strike in retaliation for Schumer’s Iran position. Their recent press release stated:
“While not unexpected, it is outrageous and unacceptable that the Democrat who wants to be the party’s leader in the Senate is siding with the Republican partisans and neoconservative ideologues who are trying to scrap this agreement and put us on the path to war.
Risking American lives in wars of choice isn’t leadership, it’s small and backward.”
Then the clincher:
“In response to Senator Schumer’s decision to side with partisan war hawks, MoveOn.org’s 8 million members are immediately launching a Democratic Party donor strike. We will organize grassroots progressives across the country to withhold campaign contributions from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and from any Democratic candidate who succeeds in undermining the president’s diplomacy with Iran. Our goal will be to secure commitments to withhold $10 million in contributions within 72 hours after this campaign launches.”