Minnesota DFL’s Ken Martin elected national Democratic Party chair on first ballot

NATIONAL HARBOR, MD. - Democratic Party leaders from across the nation on Saturday elected Minnesota DFL Chair Ken Martin to lead the Democratic National Committee, bringing an end to a three-month battle over who will take the party into the future after major losses in 2024.

Martin won the job on the first ballot with support of 246 of the 448 DNC members, or 55%. A majority of votes was needed to win.

Martin cast himself as a friend of labor and the son of a single mother who grew up in poverty and can bring the working class back into the party in both red and blue states.

He acknowledged that Democrats were “punched in the mouth in November” but vowed they would “get off the mat [and] get back in this fight” if they elected him chair.

“A lot of people in this country right now are going to need us to walk and chew gum at the same time, meaning we’re going to have to fight the extremes of Donald Trump, while we make a sharp case to families in both red states and blue states about why they should trust us with their votes,” Martin told supporters before the vote.

[More: Gov. Tim Walz endorses Richard Carlbom as next DFL Party chair.]

Martin was locked into an eight-person race with two other front-runners: Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler and former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley.

Insiders said Martin was the favorite of the three to succeed Chair Jaime Harrison, even though Wikler had lined up support from prominent elected leaders, such as House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Ahead of the vote, candidates Marianne Williamson and Nate Snyder withdrew from the race and announced their support for Martin.

After his victory, Martin said he plans to kick off the “post-election review process” on his first day as chair to figure out what went wrong in Donald Trump’s decisive victory over Vice President Kamala Harris.

Now, he said, the focus will be on aggressively taking on the president.

“We’re taking the gloves off,” Martin told reporters. “I’ve always viewed my role as the chair of the Democratic Party to take the low road, so my candidates and elected officials can take the high road, meaning I’m going to throw a punch.

“So Donald Trump, Republican Party, this is a new DNC. We are not going to sit back and not take you on when you fail the American people.”

DFL politicos descended on Washington, D.C., before the vote, which took place at the nearby Gaylord National Resort Convention Center in National Harbor.

Minnesota Attorney General — and former DNC deputy chair — Keith Ellison, Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar and St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter attended Saturday’s meeting. So did DNC member Ron Harris, who was most recently state campaign director for the Harris-Walz campaign.

Flanagan joined Martin’s supporters on stage to introduce him before the vote and outline the DFL Party’s accomplishments under his leadership.

Martin, she said, “is incredibly dedicated to building this party, and because he did that in Minnesota, we won paid family and medical leave, child tax credit.”

Flanagan said he also protected access to abortion and reproductive rights.

“Let me tell you, that this is the kind of work that we will see all across the country when Ken Martin is our party chair,” she said.

Though the majority of the voters backed Martin, one DNC member said he chose to back O’Malley largely because of the DFL Party’s endorsement of a nonresident in a safely Democratic state House district in the fall.

David Roth of Idaho said Martin should have taken responsibility for Curtis Johnson, the DFL candidate who won the Roseville-area seat but resigned after a judge ruled he didn’t meet the state’s residency requirement. Johnson’s resignation has contributed to a partisan standoff in the Minnesota House.

“By all accounts, literally every single person has said they could have put any Democrat in that seat and won. And they put someone who didn’t live there,” Roth said. “When you’re the state party chair, the buck stops there.”

Ellison navigated a tight DNC chair race in 2017 against Tom Perez, who ultimately won with the support of then-Vice President Joe Biden. Perez, who had been labor secretary under President Barack Obama, served as DNC chair until 2021.

Ellison said he had hoped Obama, Biden and major political figures would stay out of this year’s DNC chair race, which they ultimately did. “Them putting their fingers on the scale impacted my chances,” Ellison said Friday.

Omar, who said she whipped votes for Martin, said the first two weeks of Trump’s second administration have marked the beginning of Democratic resistance.

“We know that [Martin] will make sure that the needs and priorities of the working people are going to be front and center,” Omar said. “And we know that he will be a strong advocate for Democrats in making sure that we are all doing what we need to do, not just to win, but to be the party of the people.”

U. S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar applauded Martin’s election. “Ken knows that we need to reach out to Americans in every state and every county, no matter how red or how blue, and he will do exactly that as our new chair of the DNC,” she said in a statement.

Over the past decade, Martin helped raise $210 million for the Minnesota DFL and landed key Democratic wins, including a trifecta at the State Capitol — the governorship and both legislative houses — in 2022.

He will remain as DFL chair until a successor can be elected on March 29.