The other day somebody posted this. I found it rather enlightening.
The case for Perez makes no sense
The differences between Perez and Ellison are minimal. Perez’s perceived qualities could easily be switched out for Ellison’s. In his endorsement, Holder said of Perez, “We need a DNC chair who is a proven fighter and a proven uniter. Tom Perez is that person.” Well, Ellison, who spent decades as an organizer before entering national politics, is running on a unity platform. Perez has also cast himself as a “progressive who gets things done.” Well, Ellison has a record of doing exactly what many in the Democratic Party want from their DNC chair—winning elections, increasing turnout, and raising small-dollar donations.
This is also why the case for Tom Perez makes no sense. If Perez is like Ellison—in both his politics and ideology—why bother fielding him in the first place?
There is one real difference between: Ellison has captured the support of the left wing. Ellison backed Sanders early in his primary race against Hillary Clinton, and was one of the first candidates to announce his bid for DNC chair. His election would generate goodwill from Sanders supporters—or, to put it another way, would avoid the enmity that would surely result from a Perez win. In the Huffington Post, one Ellison supporter put it succinctly: “Keith Ellison had incredible support from the quote-unquote establishment side of the party, the progressive side of the party, the grassroots and the elected officials. Nobody was clamoring for another entrance, and yet we got one foisted upon us. If Tom Perez were to win, the message that would send to the grassroots, to labor unions that endorsed Ellison before Tom Perez joined the race, [is] that their voices, their muscle, their enthusiasm and turnout doesn’t matter.”
As Jeff Stein points out at Vox, Sanders supporters are likely overstating the power of the DNC chair. But that is all the more reason to throw them a win. If an Ellison victory is a modest, symbolic concession, the upside is that Democrats will signal to progressive and younger voters, who Democrats will be desperate to turn out in 2018 and 2020, that they are on their side.
It appears that the underlying reason some Democrats prefer Perez over Ellison has nothing to do with ideology, but rather his loyalty to the Obama wing. As the head of the DNC, Perez would allow that wing to retain more control, even if Obama-ites loath to admit it. Sanders has been accused of re-litigating the primary in his criticisms of Perez, but the fact that Perez was pushed to run, while Ellison was quickly and easily unifying the left and center, seems like the move most predicated on primary scars.
This reluctance to cede control comes despite the fact that Democrats have lost over 1,000 state legislature seats since 2009. There is no case for Perez that cannot be made for Ellison, while Ellison is able to energize progressives in ways that Perez cannot.
The question that will be answered on Saturday is whether Democrats have more urgent priorities than denying power to the left.
https://newrepublic.com/article/140847/case-tom-perez-makes-no-sense