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New York Times opinion columnist Michelle Goldberg blasted the Democratic National Committee’s long-awaited 2024 election autopsy Friday, deriding the report as “mysterious,” “anticlimactic” and “ridiculous” after months of internal party drama over its release.
“The document, it’s now clear, was kept under wraps not because it was impolitic, but because it’s a disaster,” Goldberg wrote, criticizing Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin for changing his rhetoric regarding the report.
“What’s most striking is its utter lack of substance,” she continued, noting that the words “Israel” and “Gaza” appear nowhere in its 192 pages.
“It offers little insight into why the Democratic Party lost large numbers of Black and Latino men, or its failure to speak to disconnected, irregular voters… I wondered if it was written by A.I., though A.I. probably would’ve done a better job,” she added.
DNC CHAIR RIPPED FOR DOWNPLAYING UNRELEASED 2024 AUTOPSY AFTER DEM LOSSES: ‘SELF-INFLICTED CRISIS’
Democrats’ 2024 election autopsy has received backlash from some Democrats and party allies. Former Vice President Kamala Harris, right, lost to President Donald Trump in the high-stakes race. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images/Jeff Swensen/Getty Images)
When vying for the DNC chairmanship, Martin ran on releasing the autopsy but, with time, said it would not be released after all.
The move, Goldberg said, made the report “an object of suspicion and fascination.”
FORMER DEM MEGADONOR BLASTS 2024 AUTOPSY AS WASTE OF TIME, SAYS REASONS FOR LOSS ARE OBVIOUS
DNC chair Ken Martin makes a speech during the press conference for the DNC site visit at Ball Arena in Denver, Colorado on Wednesday, May 6. (Hyoung Chang/The Denver Post via Getty Images)
“Some thought he was protecting Kamala Harris ahead of 2028. Many progressives were convinced that the D.N.C. quashed the autopsy because it would show Harris was done in by Gaza. Rob Flaherty, who’d been deputy director of both the Harris and Joe Biden campaigns, speculated that it didn’t even exist,” she wrote.
Over at The Washington Post, conservative opinion columnist Ramesh Ponnuru focused on what wasn’t in the report: “There’s nothing about President Joe Biden’s age and voters’ worries about it. Nothing about the border crisis the Democrats first caused through their policies and then denied in their rhetoric. Nothing about the party’s declining appeal to religiously observant voters. Nothing about the boutique left-wing views — such as support for taxpayer-funded sex changes for illegal immigrants and prisoners.”
The report was ultimately released Thursday and initially covered by CNN, argues the party weakened its infrastructure through declining voter registration, cuts to state party support and a failure to listen to certain voter groups.
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Then-Vice President Kamala Harris greets Beau Biden Jr. as former Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff, then-President Joe Biden, and Hunter Biden look on during the first day of the Democratic National Convention at the United Center in Chicago, Ill., on Aug. 19, 2024. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
The report also notes that the party must have a renewed focus on voters in Middle America and the South.
It has already created internal tensions within the party, with Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin publicly distancing himself from the autopsy, saying it doesn’t meet his standards.
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“I am not proud of this product; it does not meet my standards, and it won’t meet your standards,” he said, adding that he could not “in good faith put the DNC’s stamp of approval on it.”
He added that the report was released for the sake of transparency “as I received it – in its entirety, unedited and unabridged – with annotations for claims that couldn’t be verified.”
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Fox News Digital reached out to the DNC for comment but did not immediately receive a response.
Fox News’ Madison Colombo contributed to this report.