The Democratic National Committee (DNC) has contributed to the rise of Donald Trump and the attention he’s been given by limiting TV debates and holding them on weekend nights, Democratic presidential candidate Martin O’Malley charged Tuesday.
Speaking to reporters following a speech at the National Immigrant Integration Conference in Brooklyn, NY, O’Malley said, “Our party bears a lot of culpability for Donald Trump’s rise by the way that we have delayed debates; we have cut off debates, and we have hidden debates.”
“We are a great people and our history has been a beacon of hope to the world. But human beings can fall very, very susceptible to fascist appeals when they feel vulnerable and feel threatened,” the Democratic presidential hopeful explained.
O’Malley insisted that the debate calendar, enforced by DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, was intentional.
“The Democratic Party needs to stop acting in undemocratic ways. The Democratic Party should not limit debates or close off debates,” he said. ” Look when the Republicans scheduled theirs: on a weeknight when the greatest number of people see it and talk about it the next day. Look when our party schedules the debates: the same time as ‘Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer’ – on a Saturday. And yet, we shrug and take it.”
Republican presidential hopefuls are expected to take the stage Tuesday evening Wolf Blitzer for the 5th TV debate aired on CNN and Facebook at Sheldon Adelson’s Venetian Casino in Las Vegas. The three Democratic candidates are set to square off for the 3rd time at Saint Anselm College in Manchester, New Hampshire, and aired on ABC, Saturday night.
Tonight’s debate will focus on National Security following the recent terror attacks in Paris and San Bernardino. According to a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll released on Monday night, 40 percent of Americans say national security and terrorism should be the government’s top priority. The poll showed that while 58 percent of Republican primary voters say national security/terrorism is their top concern, just 26 percent of Democratic primary voters who say that.
But O’Malley argued national security and domestic issues go hand-in-hand, insisting that the shift of the public debate over the war on terror and homeland security does not in any way reshape the race or have an effect on his candidacy. “I’m the only candidate that has actually – since the attacks on September 11th (2001)- been at the forefront of homeland security and preparedness in our own country, ” the former Maryland Governor told Jewish Insider. “So, I look forward to this debate – the defining debate. The first job of the President of the U.S. is to protect the people of the United States, and Governors have led us successfully and victoriously through two world wars. And I have the ability and discipline that I have learned by being a chief executive to keep the people of the U.S. safe.”
O’Malley said the Democratic presidential candidates have not yet debated and discussed the issue enough in the last debate, but he hopes to draw a stark contrast with his main rival Hillary Clinton in the next debate. “I think Secretary Clinton has not demonstrated the ability to anticipate change,” he stressed. “I think she has shown time and time again that while she has a reflexive pole for the big military intervention, she does not have the foresight to anticipate change or, really, to be the sort of collaborative leader that can reform these sigh load bureaucracies that – still today – fail to communicate with each other even on things of routine, or checking social media to see if people have dedicated themselves to jihad before granting them visas.”
“As the nature of warfare has changed, so too must the nature of our own leadership here,” O’Malley told Jewish Insider. “We have to become a lot more collaborative, a lot more fast and much more quickly adapting to the change.”
“It is like an immune system in your own body,” he asserted. “Your immune system is strong not because it outnumbers the bad bugs in the world or the germs. Your immune system is strong because it is better connected, more intelligent, and it could respond more quickly. And that’s what we need to be able to do.There’s a lot of talk about sharing information between our country and other countries, but we have challenges still in our own nation in sharing information from our federal, our state and our local government.”
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