Tuscaloosa County Democrats Blast SDEC Leadership Over New Party Bylaws

TUSCALOOSA, AL — Internal turbulence would be putting it mildly when considering the infighting at present that has consumed the Alabama Democratic Party following the recent adoption of its new bylaws over the weekend.

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Reporter Alander Rocha of The Alabama Reflector reports that the State Democratic Executive Committee on Saturday approved changes to the party bylaws, in place since 2019, that eliminated the party's youth, LGBTQ+ and disabled caucuses.

The new bylaws were passed with a vote of 63-49, with one local party member telling Tuscaloosa Patch that the decision was made without a vote from 25 members belonging to the youth — a number that would have swung the outcome of the vote. This was supposedly because of the failure of the caucus to pay outstanding dues.

The Alabama Reflector also reported that the leadership of the party backed minority affairs chair Joe Reed, arguing that the old bylaws took power away from Black Democrats and cast doubt on the legality of the last set of bylaws passed by Doug Jones and former DNC Chair Tom Perez in 2019.

Tuscaloosa County Democratic Party Chair Judith C. Taylor told Patch that despite the backlash against the changes to the party's bylaws, the SDEC passed the revised bylaws at Reed's direction.

Click here to read the revised bylaws.

"I and many of my fellow Alabama Democrats, Black and White, are tired of the divisions in our party," Taylor said. "It is time for one Democratic Party. It is not a matter of whether leadership is Black or White. It is a matter of effective respectful leadership. A 62% Black party that represents 27% of the Alabama voters will not win elections. But Black, White, Hispanic and Asian voters might."

Taylor then explained that, in 2019, the Democratic National Committee ordered the party to revise its bylaws to include more minority representation of Hispanics, Asians and Pacific Islanders, Native Americans, youth, LGBTQ+ individuals and those with disabilities. This was supposed to be made possible through the bylaws passed on Oct. 5, 2019.

However, Taylor then lamented that the new bylaws instead removed this minority representation.

"I ... assure our members and the community that the Tuscaloosa County Democratic Party intends to remain inclusive and welcoming to all Democrats," she said. "We will continue to support the rights of all of our members. We will actively recruit and support the youth, LGBTQ+, Hispanic, Asian, Pacific Islander and Native American communities as we do our Black and White Democrats."

West Alabama Young Democrats President KeUndra Cox also vented his frustrations in an interview with Patch, saying he and his colleagues are outraged by the party leadership's decision to eliminate the different minority caucuses.

"It feels like we were making progress to move forward and now it feels like we've been set back and our voice is taken away," he said. "Young people, by and large, vote Democrat. When you understand that and you tell us you don't want to give us a voice on the state committee, it will only cause trouble down the line when it comes to winning elections."

Indeed, Cox says much in the way of misleading information or outright disinformation has been circling throughout the party, resulting in some caucus members voting for the new bylaws without truly understanding what was at stake.

"I'm terrified," Cox said. "Right now, we're trying hard to pull more young people into the political system and get them involved and make them believe. But that's hard to do when you have a state party who has eliminated the voice of young people. They've also pulled out the voice of the LGTBQ caucus. It's my hope the voters can see past all of that. You have to go off what you can see and what they are seeing is a party who is not being inclusive to all."

Above all, though, Cox said the lingering question remains — "why?"

"How is this going to elect more Democrats?" Cox asked. "I don't know what the point is, other than holding onto power. But we're hoping to fix this as soon as possible."

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