ADC’s Joe Reed attacks Doug Jones, Blames ‘white people’ leaving party for Alabama Dems’ problems in letter

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April 1, 2019

According to a letter obtained by Yellowhammer News, Alabama Democratic Conference chairman Joe Reed attacked Sen. Doug Jones (D-Mountain Brook) and blamed him for the Democratic National Committee’s call for the Alabama Democratic Party to hold new elections for chairman and vice chairman.

Details of the letter dated March 22 and addressed to “The Prevailing Ethnic Minority Members of the State Democratic Executive Committee (SDEC)” first surfaced in a Montgomery Advertiser story last week.

Reed called on members of the ADC to “unite” on May 4, 2019, the tentative date for elections, to re-elect current chairwoman Nancy Worley and vice chairman Randy Kelley. However, the letter also blames “white people” for the Alabama Democratic Party’s shortcomings.

After offering details of the call for new elections, Reed accuses Jones of persuading Democratic National Committee chairman Tom Perez of giving Jones “another chance” of gaining control of the Alabama Democratic Party.

Reed dismisses the candidacy of former Sen. Myron Penn (D-Union Springs) and accuses opponents of the status quo of being dissatisfied over Worley and Kelley requiring county parties “to have regular meetings, have a full slate of officers, make financial reports, recruit Democrats to run for office and treat Black Democrats fairly.”

The ADC head does address the current problems of the Alabama Democratic Party, which he assigns the blame in part to “white people” leaving the party.

“Whatever problems the Democratic Party has cannot be attributed to the chair and vice chair,” Reed wrote. “White people left the democratic party; not blacks. When Obama won 2008, the next general election in Alabama was in 2010 when the Republicans defeated enough Democrats to become a Majority in the legislature for the first time in the history of Alabama! Nancy Worley was not Chair, Mark Kennedy was Chair. But Mark cannot be blamed for that; white people have been leaving the Democratic Party in Alabama since 1948. In 2018 only two white democrats were elected to the Legislature, one in the House and one in the Senate.”

Also in the letter, Reeds reminds recipients they are “expected” to purchase tables for a luncheon for the ADC’s annual conference later this month, with those expectations set by the size of the county and prices ranging from $50-$500.