fb-pixelOutgoing Democratic Party chair won’t gavel open convention - The Boston Globe Skip to main content

Outgoing Democratic Party chair won’t gavel open convention

Outgoing Democratic National Committee chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz was heckled at a breakfast of Florida delegates Monday, with opponents shouting, ‘‘Shame!’‘
Outgoing Democratic National Committee chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz was heckled at a breakfast of Florida delegates Monday, with opponents shouting, ‘‘Shame!’’

Outgoing Democratic National Committee chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz abruptly canceled her plan to gavel open the party’s convention just hours before the first session.

In a brief phone conversation with the Sun Sentinel newspaper of Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., Wasserman Schultz said:

‘‘I have decided that in the interest of making sure that we can start the Democratic convention on a high note that I am not going to gavel in the convention.’’

The Florida congresswoman had been heckled at a breakfast of Florida delegates Monday morning, with opponents shouting, ‘‘Shame!’’

Wasserman Schultz told the crowd during a raucous scene that ‘‘we have to make sure that we move together in a unified way.’’ But supporters of Bernie Sanders shouted at her during her brief remarks to the breakfast.

Advertisement



The party is facing a firestorm over hacked emails that suggested the DNC favored Hillary Clinton in the presidential primaries against Bernie Sanders.

Wasserman Schultz announced Sunday that she would resign as the party’s chair at the end of this week’s Democratic National Convention.

Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook said later Monday that it was Wasserman Schultz who made the decision to step down as party chairwoman and that she intends to gavel in.

Mook also pointed to reports that Russian state actors breached the Democratic National Committee’s servers and leaked the e-mails with the purpose of helping Donald Trump.

The FBI has confirmed it is investigating the breach.

Outgoing Democratic Party chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz was heckled during a breakfast for the Florida delegation Monday in Philadelphia. Matt Slocum/Associated Press

Wasserman Schultz will serve as honorary chair of the Clinton campaign’s 50-state program to help elect Democrats around the country, the presumptive Democratic nominee said Sunday.

The scandal is rocking the party on the eve of their convention, and the fall is a stunning one for the tough-talking Florida representative who became the first woman elected to chair the DNC. Two other women have served in the role but were appointed.

Advertisement



On Sunday, Wasserman Schultz announced she would step down as DNC chairwoman at the end of the party’s convention, after some of the 19,000 emails, presumably stolen from the DNC by hackers, were posted to the website Wikileaks.

To Sanders’ supporters, the email scandal proved what they long suspected: The Democratic Party had become a clubby establishment that was resistant to change and reluctant to embrace a more progressive agenda.

For years though, it seemed, Wasserman Schultz was unstoppable.

At 26, she was the youngest woman elected to a seat in the Florida’s House. Then came the Florida Senate, and in 2005, she was elected to the U.S. House to represent South Florida. It was there Wasserman Schultz earned her reputation as a workhorse and outspoken liberal willing to spar with Republicans on television.

By her mid-40s, Wasserman Schultz had survived breast cancer and was raising three kids — all the while serving in the House and raising millions for the Democratic Party.

By 2011, President Barack Obama recommended she take control of the DNC, even though she had backed Hillary Clinton in the 2008 primary. Perhaps part of the calculation was that Wasserman Schultz represented South Florida, a Democrat-rich area of a critical swing state in the upcoming election. As a Jew and strong advocate for Israel, she also provided a bulwark for Obama against Republican efforts at the time to paint him as anti-Israel.

Wasserman Schultz was born in 1966 on Long Island, New York. According to her online biography, she graduated from the University of Florida. She married Steve Schultz and resides with her family in Weston, a Fort Lauderdale suburb.

Advertisement



Worth noting is whom Wasserman Schultz replaced at the DNC five years ago: Tim Kaine, who is now Clinton’s running mate.

‘‘As Chairman Kaine departs, new leadership must come on,’’ Vice President Joe Biden wrote in 2011 to DNC members.

Wasserman Schultz was also considered a close friend of Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who was critically wounded during a shooting rampage in Tucson. Wasserman Schultz was reportedly in Giffords’ hospital room when she first woke up.

Watch: Wasserman Schultz heckled