Minnesota state party chair Ken Martin was elected on Saturday as the next leader of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) after securing more than 246 votes out of the 428 members who voted, winning on the first ballot.
Martin was seen as one of the frontrunners in the race, beating Wisconsin state party chair Ben Wikler and former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, who were among the seven other candidates running against the Minnesota Democrat.
“Let me just start out by saying we have one team,” Martin told DNC committee members in his address after his win. “One team. The Democratic Party.”
Martin touted the state party’s track record of winning 25 statewide elections since he took the helm of the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor (DFL) Party in 2011 and his perch as the president of Association of State Democratic Committees (ASDC).
The Minnesota Democrat had at one point said he had endorsements from 200 DNC committee members and did receive the backing of some prominent Democrats like Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.).
Notably, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) and Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) backed Wikler, though their backing was clearly not enough to sway enough members toward endorsing the Wisconsin state party chair.
Martin will be at least one figure the party will be able to turn to as a unifier-in-chief and leader, as few Democrats have immediately emerged from November’s election to guide the party. particularly with former President Biden and former Vice President Harris stepping away from the spotlight.
Some of that was on display during his remarks to DNC committee members.
“As I said from the beginning, I’m not running against them any more than they were running against us,” he said of his fellow seven challengers.
“It is my guarantee to each of you that we’re going to take the great ideas from all the candidates in this race, we’re going to bring them into this great party, we’re going to unify this party together and we’re all going to roll up our sleeves together to build this party,” he added, before giving shoutouts to each DNC chair candidate.
Martin faces a tough task ahead as the next DNC chair, who will not only have to bring together different factions of the party but also guide the party’s response in opposing President Trump in his second term in office.
That task will be particularly challenging with Democrats out of power in Congress and the White House.
Updated at 2:37 p.m. EST