Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin is publicly disowning his party’s own 2024 election “autopsy,” calling the long-delayed report a product that “does not meet my standards” after Democrats suffered what he described as a “painful and consequential” defeat to President Donald Trump.
The blunt admission came as Martin described former Vice President Kamala Harris’ 2024 defeat as a “punch to the gut” and acknowledged the Democratic Party’s “brand is in trouble and needs repair.”
“I am not proud of this product; it does not meet my standards, and it won’t meet your standards,” Martin said of the report, adding that he could not “in good faith put the DNC’s stamp of approval on it.”
Martin emphasized that he was releasing the report 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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The report argues Democrats weakened their own political infrastructure through cuts to state party support, declining voter registration efforts and reduced grassroots organizing, while also failing to listen to key voting blocs — mistakes it says allowed Republicans to make gains with voters Democrats have increasingly struggled to reach, particularly in middle America.
CNN was first to release a copy of the report.
Annotations that appear in the report, however, pick apart certain claims for lacking evidence.
READ THE DNC 2024 ELECTION AUTOPSY – APP USERS, CLICK HERE:
In one such section, the report claims that “the Harris campaign appears to have relied on Trump being unacceptable rather than building an affirmative case for Harris,” to which an annotation reads, “No evidence provided for this claim.”
Martin, who was elected DNC chair early last year, has faced pressure from within the party and increased public criticism over the autopsy controversy and over the DNC’s fundraising woes. The party remains far behind the rival Republican National Committee in a key fundraising metric: cash on hand.
Former DNC vice chair David Hogg, a vocal Martin critic, on Thursday called for the chairman to resign.
“This autopsy, and the months-long debate about even releasing the report, is a demoralizing joke. It’s clear that Chair Ken Martin has lost the confidence of his staff, supporters, and most importantly, millions of Americans counting on the DNC to help Democrats win up and down the ballot in 2026 and 2028,” Hogg charged.
“Ken Martin should resign, and the DNC should select a new leader who demonstrates competence, creativity, moral clarity, and a relentless commitment to actually changing the broken Democratic Party brand,” Hogg emphasized.
Hogg, a gun-control crusader who was elected a DNC vice chair as Martin won election as chair, stepped down from his position last summer after upsetting party leaders for his efforts backing primary challenges against what he called “asleep at the wheel” older, longtime incumbents in safe, blue districts.
Dan Pfeiffer, a former senior advisor to then-President Barack Obama and a co-host of the popular progressive podcast “Pod Save America” who has been critical of Martin’s handling of the autopsy, also urged that the chair step down.
“Ken Martin is not up to the job, and his continued presence is going to make the DNC woefully ineffective heading into the midterms and then the critical 2028 primaries, where the DNC plays a major role,” Pfeiffer argued. “He should step down for the good of the party, and if he won’t, the DNC should fire him.”
Martin has insisted numerous times in recent months that he would not step down, and pointed to the slew of ballot box victories and election overperformances by Democrats in the 16 months since Donald Trump returned to the White House.
Following the Democrats’ sweeping losses in the 2024 election cycle, the DNC launched an internal autopsy investigating where the party fell short in securing a win in both the presidential election and the majority in Congress.
Democratic Party officials interviewed over 300 Democrats from all 50 states for the report, which Martin promised would examine the party’s mistakes in 2024 and offer a roadmap to victory going forward.
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There was controversy surrounding the report as it was being compiled, after reports last summer said the autopsy would skip analyzing whether then-President Joe Biden should have run for re-election in 2024 and would pass on judging key decisions made by Harris and her team, after she replaced Biden as the party’s nominee with just over three months to go until the 2024 election.
Despite facing growing calls from Democrats to release the report, DNC officials had argued it was being withheld ahead of the midterms to keep the party focused on retaking the House and Senate in November. Martin said in a statement at the time that if releasing the autopsy will not help Democrats win in the midterms, then it is purely a “distraction.”
Other Democrats argued publicly releasing the autopsy before the midterms would improve transparency and help the party regroup ahead of November’s elections.
Harris, who is mulling making another White House bid in 2028, recently told donors she believed the DNC should make the autopsy public. The news was first reported by NBC News and confirmed by Fox News Digital.
A source with knowledge said that Harris had not discussed the autopsy with DNC Chair Ken Martin, and that the former vice president did not know in advance about Martin’s decision in December to keep the 2024 election postmortem under wraps.
Fox News Digital’s Leo Briceno and Hannah Brennan contributed to this report.