Politics

DNC Chair Tom Perez Comes Under Fire For Lack Of Hiring Diversity

REUTERS/Joshua Roberts

Julia Nista General Assignment Reporter
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Progressive activist Stephanie Strong Hill called out DNC Chairman Tom Perez to his face over the DNC not hiring enough black women at a left-wing event earlier this month.

WATCH (Relevant Portion 1:02:30 — 1:10:45):

At the Faith In Action, Action Day event, Hill commented, “It has been said that the African American woman vote is the most taken for granted within the party.”

“As you have taken leadership in the DNC, how are you addressing this issue?” Hill asked Perez. She added, “In particular, how are you listening to the voices of poor and working class women of color on the ground and using these community leaders as paid strategists for campaigns?”

Perez dodged the question, even admitting that when he first took over the DNC, “We had to do some soul-searching” and that the DNC “had taken people for granted, most notably, our most loyal constituency, African Americans.”

The DNC chair then went on to describe the DNC’s accomplishments, until Hill interrupted him.

“But how many women, black women, African American women have been employed as strategists?” Hill asked.

She then commented, “African American women are holding the Democratic party together,” adding that if their work goes unnoticed they “feel used,” and that they feel it is an “insult.”

Perez has recently been under fire for lack of hiring diversity in the DNC. In an analysis of DNC spending on consultancy work from March 2017 to February 2018, only 17.6 percent of the $17.5 million budget has gone to racial and minority-owned business. The analysis stated only 6.4 percent of spending went to black-owned business, and Latino spending allocation was even less at 4.3 percent.

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