Thursday, August 16, 2012

Former MoCo Democratic Party Chair Karen Britto Says Party Leader Trying to "Divide & Conquer" Maryland Minorities

Maryland Juice previously reported that Karen Britto, the former Chair of Montgomery County's Democratic Central Committee, was organizing an effort to encourage more racial and ethnic minorities to seek elected office. She recently held two gatherings of minority elected officials and political activists, which each brought dozens and dozens of MoCo residents together to discuss the 2014 Democratic primaries in Maryland.

GUEST COMMENTARY FROM KAREN BRITTO: In a strange twist, we received a guest post from Ms. Britto this week. She alleges that an unnamed "elected official" is trying to "divide and conquer" groups that might get involved with her effort.
GUEST POST - Divide and Conquer People of Color?

by Karen Britto // former Montgomery County Democratic Central Committee Chair

After a successful People of Color summit was held to elect Democrats in 2014 and beyond – The People of Color Coalition were well aware that efforts to draw a wedge between our group could ensue.  Well, it has happened.
A Democratic leader in the state who is an elected official met with a member of one of the ethnic partners and warned the community away from the organizing effort.   
People of Color are very confused by leadership attempts to diffuse our organizing efforts.  Creating a forum to infuse new energy and new volunteers to the Party should be the goal of all Democrats and forging opportunities for a diverse electorate should be the objective of all Democratic leaders in the State. 
Although organizers of the People of Color summit find the attempt to weaken their efforts to bring new people to the Democratic Party very disconcerting, they are delighted that volunteers from national civil rights organizations have offered their training services to thwart these divide and conquer tactics and to bring national attention to the efforts to elect Democrats who reflect the changing demographics in the State of Maryland.   These divide and conquer tactics have historically been used against people of color to help the status quo to maintain control.

People of Color are the most faithful Democratic voters and volunteers.  These loyal voters contend that more participation of African American, Latino, Asian, Women, Young People, and Continental African Democrats will have a powerful and positive impact on Maryland politics for many years to come.

Interesting development in the MoCo political field. More interesting would be finding out the identity of this unnamed Democratic official!

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