What a Veteran of Bernie Sanders, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi Thinks the DNC Is Getting Wrong

Faiz Shakir has made a late entrance into the race to be the DNC’s chair.

Faiz Shakir

Faiz Shakir previously served as a new digital media adviser for Harry Reid. Douglas Graham/CQ Roll Call via AP

Two candidates — Ben Wikler and Ken Martin — have dominated the race to chair the Democratic National Committee. Now weeks from the election, a late entrant, albeit no stranger to party politics, says they’ve been campaigning for the job all wrong.

Faiz Shakir, Bernie Sanders’ 2020 campaign manager and veteran of Nancy Pelosi’s and Harry Reid’s offices, said he is running to disrupt the “constrained, status quo style of thinking” he argues is dominating the party.

“I sense that there’s too much focus on the internal bureaucracy — which you have to figure out, certainly — but you’re missing the forest for the trees,” Shakir told NOTUS.