Maddow: Sanders Formally Demands DNC Disqualify Barney Frank, Dannel Malloy From Platform Committee

Campaign’s Attorneys Send Formal Letter Threatening Convention Disruption

Rachel Maddow Friday night broke news that attorneys for the Bernie Sanders for President Campaign have just sent a letter to the Democratic National Committee formally demanding the disqualification of two Democratic Party platform committee chairs: former U.S. Rep. Barney Frank, and Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy.

Maddow (video above, starting at the 5:30 mark) notes that DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz gave Bernie Sanders a “big concession” by allowing him to choose one-third of the members of the Democratic Platform Committee when the rules state the DNC Chair gets to choose them.

She then shows the letter from Sanders’ lawyers, and says, “the Sanders campaign is lodging a formal credentials challenge against the chair of the platform committee and the chair of the rules committee.”

The letter calls Rep. Frank and Gov. Malloy “self-proclaimed partisans intent on marginalizing” Sanders Campaign supporters.

She adds, “the Sanders Campaign then ends this letter with a threat. If the Committee doesn’t kick Gov. Malloy and Barney Frank out of those leadership positions the Sanders campaign will essentially grind the process of the convention to a halt.”

“They will gum up the works so nothing happens.”

What Maddow doesn’t clearly state is the reason the Sanders Campaign is requesting Frank and Malloy be disqualified is that they have been critical of Bernie Sanders. She also does not note that Sanders appointed Cornel West to the committee, and he has repeatedly been highly critical of Hillary Clinton.

Daily Kos excerpted these sections of the letter:

Mr. Frank’s animosity toward Senator Sanders dates back decades. In 1991, while serving alongside Senator Sanders on the House Financial Service Committee, Mr. Frank accused Senator Sanders of “unduly denigrat[ing] the institution and a lot of the members” of Congress. After Senator Sanders won the New Hampshire Democratic presidential primaries [sic] in February, Mr. Frank wrote an opinion piece in which he professed his “resentment” toward the Senator. And Mr. Frank’s invective against Senator Sanders has only intensified as Senator Sanders has notched additional primary victories. 

Governor Malloy has unfairly ascribed blame for national gun control laws single-handedly to Senator Sanders, referring to the three-day wait provision of the Brady Bill as the “Charleston-Sanders loophole.” Malloy has even ventured that Senator Sanders should be “held accountable” for the “death and destruction” cause [sic] by his “mistakes.”

On Twitter, many were displeased with the Sanders Campaign action:

 Maddow posted the letter to MSNBC’s website, we’re posting it below, with a few added highlights in red: