The Democratic National Committee awards few contracts to companies controlled by racial minority groups, Democratic party insiders said on Monday, despite repeated pledges to increase business to such firms.
Instead, Democratic leaders claim progress by leaning on a broader definition of “minority contractors” that includes white women, the disabled and the gay community, according to internal memos and emails obtained by The Huffington Post and corroborated by those insiders.
African American Democratic loyalists are frustrated with the party for failing to use its institutional finances to advance the cause of fair racial representation in the lucrative business of politics.
“There is no more loyal group of voters to the DNC than black people, and yet they have done nothing to ensure that that constituency is able to participate fully in the economic benefits of party business,” said a DNC member who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Meanwhile DNC leaders say they take such concerns seriously, having launched a broad review of the committee’s hiring practices and they remain committed to diversity, as does the broader party.
An analysis done for The Huffington Post by the Center for Responsive Politics showed that of the $759 million spent by the Democratic Party committees, including the DNC, on consultants, pollsters, fundraisers and strategists during the last election cycle, a mere 1.5 percent or $11.4 million, was expended on firms with at least one African-American senior principal.
While the DNC lumps together white women, blacks, Hispanics, Asians, the disabled and members of the LGBT community as “minorities” generally, the result of such an umbrella grouping has led to a further diminished share of contracts awarded to racial minorities, while those going to white women and gay men have been bolstered, according to people close to the process.
Said a DNC member who is black, “I have nothing against those groups, but what about us?”
The paucity of contracts to minority companies is nothing new within the Democratic National Party, but there is renewed concern as Democrats begin to lay the groundwork for the 2012 Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina.
The DNC recently agreed to hire a chief diversity officer to “ensure that the DNC’s vendors and staff reflect the face of America,” Rep. Barbara Lee of California wrote and who now heads an ad hoc committee to keep an eye on minority contracting and hiring.
Despite all this however, it is left to be seen how many minority vendors will actually receive contracts in the 2012 election cycle.
