WASHINGTON _ Rep. Keith Ellison picked up a semi-endorsement from an expected _ and potentially unwelcome _ source Wednesday morning in his bid to become Democratic National Committee chair: Donald Trump.
With DNC members set to vote on a new leader in just three days, the Republican president, apparently while watching morning cable news talk shows, felt the need to weigh in. He did so with a tweet that pointed out Ellison predicted Trump would become the 45th chief executive, shortly after former DNC Chairman Howard Dean endorsed an Ellison opponent on MSNBC.
In fact, Trump seemed to suggest the Minnesota Democrat is something of a political soothsayer, tweeting that "he was the one who predicted early that I would win!"
Ellison is in a race with former Labor Secretary Tom Perez; Jaime Harrison, chair of the South Carolina Democratic Party; Pete Buttigieg, the young South Bend, Ind., mayor; Sally Boynton Brown, executive director of the Idaho Democratic Party; and Jehmu Greene, former president of Rock the Vote and a political analyst.
Trump's Wednesday tweet, which came one day after Trump fired off nary a morning social media post, followed Dean's "Morning Joe" endorsement of Buttigieg, the 35-year-old mayor.
Ellison, thus far, has racked up the most congressional endorsements. But that doesn't mean he will win the job on Saturday. That's because his lawmaker colleagues won't be casting votes. The winner will be decided by a majority of DNC members. Multiple ballots could be needed for Ellison or another candidate to secure the 224 (of 447) votes needed to win.
It is doubtful that the president's kind words will boost Ellison's bid. After all, Trump is deeply unpopular with Democrats: An Economist/YouGov poll conducted Feb. 12-14 found 67 percent of members of that party "strongly disapprove" of his job performance, and another 12 percent "somewhat disapprove."
The poll also found that 76 percent of Democrats surveyed simply dislike the president. Sixty-nine percent said they think Trump doesn't care "at all" about people like them, with another 12 percent of Democrats saying he cares "not much" about them.
(The poll surveyed 1,500 people, and had a 3.1 percent margin of error. The Economist Group is the parent company of CQ Roll Call.)
This is the first time since 2005 there has been an open race for chairmanship. A Democratic president typically chooses the DNC boss, but with Obama's departure and Hillary Clinton's surprising general election defeat, the party is without a true leader to annoint a hand-picked committee chair.
