I read the article in Alabama Political Reporter by Josh Moon and as a Democrat, I am beyond fed up. It was posted on Facebook but I think the many comments have been deleted. I wish they had left them up there. I am sad to say that Mr. Moon’s article was on point.
Those of us who have been watching this ship burn started out as being hopeful that the Party would come together. That hope slowly died as our Chairman immediately began his hateful remarks almost from day one. This was encouraged by Vice Chair of Minority Affairs and President of the Alabama Democratic Conference, Joe Reed. Or……it could be the other way around. It’s hard to tell. The continued racist comments from our leadership has now turned into a nationwide comedy show. The Alabama Republicans are loving every miserable minute of this dog and pony show!
Early on Chairman Randy Kelley did a podcast with the Alabama Political Reporter and he made some of the most insulting comments about Vice Chair Tabitha Isner. He said that she was, and I’m paraphrasing, a hysterical jealous woman with mental problems. He sent out a letter to those of us in the SDEC that stated that we were not to pay any attention to Isner because “she doesn’t speak for the Democratic Party.” Upon information and belief, Vice Chair Isner has been treated with disrespect from her first day in office.
Our Democratic office in Montgomery was vacated and moved into the same building as the Alabama Democratic Conference without notice or approval from the SDEC. Vice Chair Isner was not given an office or an email address. The tacky comments kept coming from Kelley and Reed to degrade Isner as much as they could. She hung in there and stood her ground and continued to stand up for herself. All of this was unnecessary and downright WRONG!
We have consistently been in lawsuits, arguments, and discord over every petty little thing that Joe Reed doesn’t get his way about. He has made the comment “I wake up every morning thinking about who I can sue.” The problem with that is, that he is doing it under the umbrella of the Alabama Democratic Party without any discussion with the SDEC. He has taken it upon himself to appoint people from the Alabama Democratic Conference (ADC) to the Executive Committee of the Alabama Democratic Party (ADP), which he has NO power to do. The Bylaws are clear in that members of the SDEC are to be nominated and voted on at the State meetings. This is a violation of the Bylaws that Reed has gotten away with and no one seems to think it’s a big deal. Except maybe for me. His intent was to place his own people on the Executive Board to secure his majority to get the Bylaws passed, among other things. This is how these pathetic Bylaws were passed that eliminated the Disability Caucus.
The reasoning for Kelley and Reed to keep hounding on and on about this was that the Disability Caucus was “taking power away from the Blacks.” I have yet to understand the logic in this. There were a lot of Blacks in the Disability Caucus who were still furious about losing their seats.
The Youth Caucus was starting to grow with young Democrats who were showing so much purpose to our Party. They were energetic, smart, and excited to work. This should have made our leadership proud. They are the future of our Party and what did the smirky duo do? They took away their caucus and we ended up losing a lot of our young Democrats who said “Bye Felicia” and left. When the DNC insisted that this be restored, many of our young Democrats did not come back.
There are countless violations that have taken place and the SDEC has been powerless to do anything about them. If you have been to the State Party meetings you know what I am talking about. Again, Reed has his people in place to second his motions and Kelley immediately passes them. When a speaker is recognized to go to the mike to speak, Reed has his own mike and stands like a buzzard over a road kill just waiting to butt in if the speaker says anything that he doesn’t like. He does not ask to be recognized to speak. He butts in, loudly and rudely and the Chair does not have any control over the room. He has even said to Vice Chair Isner “Sit down, girl, and shut up!” We have had several times when there have been questions about the vote count. We will ask for a roll call vote and every time it is denied. As soon as they get their motions passed, Kelley will adjourn the meetings even though we have questions on the floor that go ignored.
This ongoing racial divide in our Party is at the hand of Kelley and Reed who have made every argument about the evil white people in our Party. They have dogged former Senator Doug Jones down like he is the Grand Wizard of the KKK! It is obvious that this fuet goes back a ways but isn’t it time to shake hands and everybody go to their own corner?
We have members of the ADC who are on the SDEC who are loud and make insulting remarks towards “us”. “US” being the white women who dare to speak up. One member, in particular, has been feeding this fire of racist hate with comments like “We deserve more because we were slaves.” No, she was never a slave and I don’t know that anyone in her family was but……..what difference does it make? This is 2024, and that ship has sailed. We are the Party who is color blind. We have fought harder and accomplished more for the Black race in this county than the Republicans and Independents put together. If we are going to show favorites to members because they are Black, that pretty much shoots the idea of equality. Sadly, this is the same message that Kelley and Reed are sending out to the ADC and it has now infected our Party with division that is wider than the Mississippi River! There is no effort to put things aside and compromise toward making our Party stronger.
We are facing the most important and I must say, dangerous election in our history. It is up to the Democrats to save this democracy. We can’t do it if we are spitting and hissing at each other. I am a member of the SDEC. I have come close to crying because I have watched as my beloved Party crumbled apart by the jealous, racist division that is supposed to be the beacon of hope for the working people, women, LGBTQ, Native Americans, Asian Americans, Hispanics, and all of the people who have never had a seat at the Republican table. We gave them one and we have kept those promises. Now, in America, we have the most repulsive human being on earth who is on the ballot to become the President of the United States. THIS should be our focus. This should be what we are fighting for. For the first time in history, the Democratic Party is putting a black woman on our ballot for President. This has broken the ceiling for every little black girl, every little white girl, every Native American, every Asian American, Hispanic, and all those little girls who can look at Vice President Harris and say “If she can do it, I can do it.” We elected the first Catholic, the first Black man to the White House. We have put Muslims and Jews in our Congress. We are the Party of the people. So, why can’t we here in Alabama get along with each other? This kind of crap is why there are no Democrats on our ballots. This is why we have a Republican regime running this State and slowly taking our rights from us. We are the only hope this State has of stopping it. We need to be shouting from the rooftops to get Kamala Harris elected!! Instead, we have a Chairman and his sidekick spewing out their jealous trouble-making mess and making all of us look like a State of hillbilly fools.
It’s time to STOP!
Lynda Kirkpatrick
Marion County Democratic Chair
SDEC HD 17 Representative