BURLINGTON, Vt. (WCAX) – Former Vermont Governor Howard Dean is among Democrats with plenty to say about where his party went wrong during last month’s presidential election.
Dean, a former presidential primary candidate himself, went on to lead the Democratic National Committee in the wake of the 2004 election that sent Republican George W. Bush back to the White House. Dean is credited with developing the “50-state strategy” that propelled Democrats to majorities in both houses of Congress and Barack Obama to the presidency four years later.
Dean says the party is failing to win local races in red states and that a similar grassroots strategy he adopted back in 2005 with the DNC is needed. “The Democratic brand is in trouble in a lot of states,” Dean said. ”If you never support them and you never talk to them and you ignore them, how do you expect Democrats at the bottom of the ticket to win?
Now, The DNC is expected to elect a new chair in February that will be tasked with helping to devise a comeback.