DNC Autopsy Blasts Harris Campaign as Party Chair Faces Calls to Resign

The Democratic National Committee has released a long-awaited 192-page post-election autopsy report that sharply criticizes Kamala Harris’s 2024 presidential campaign, triggering an immediate crisis of confidence in party leadership as DNC Chair Ken Martin faces mounting calls to resign.

The report, released on May 21 after more than a year of delays, accuses Harris of having “wrote off rural America” and failing to attack Donald Trump with sufficient “negative firepower,” according to AP News. It also found that Democratic leadership made “a decision not to engage in negative advertising at the scale required” against Trump, despite the Trump campaign and allied Super PACs going “full throttle” against Harris.

A Report Disavowed by Its Own Party

In an extraordinary move, each page of the report carried a disclaimer stating: “This document reflects the views of the author, not the DNC” and that the committee “was not provided with the underlying sourcing, interviews, or supporting data for many of the assertions.” Martin himself admitted he is “not proud of this product” and said he could not “in good faith put the DNC’s stamp of approval on it.”

Martin announced that the report’s primary author, consultant Paul Rivera, was no longer working with the DNC. Entire sections of the document were reportedly left blank, and it was riddled with omissions and factual errors, according to Fox News.

Major Omissions Draw Fire

The report conspicuously avoids several of the most contentious issues from the 2024 campaign. It does not mention Gaza or Israel, former President Joe Biden’s age or his decision to seek reelection, the rushed selection of Harris as the nominee, or her choice of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as running mate.

Progressive lawmakers were quick to condemn the omissions. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., called it “pretty unbelievable that Gaza would not be mentioned once in the autopsy report,” telling reporters it was “a major oversight.” Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., went further, saying: “One of the reasons we lost was our blank check to Israel and Netanyahu while they committed genocide in Gaza. We must speak and confront hard truths if this party is to win in 2028.”

Calls for Martin’s Resignation Intensify

The fallout has been swift and severe. Multiple prominent Democratic figures have called for Martin to step down, arguing that his handling of the report demonstrates a fundamental failure of leadership just months before the 2026 midterm elections.

Rep. Mark Veasey, D-Texas, told Semafor: “There doesn’t seem to be a plan to turn things around and the clock is ticking. November is literally around the corner… I believe it’s time for him to move on.”

Dan Pfeiffer, former senior adviser to President Barack Obama, wrote that “it’s hard to imagine anyone handling anything worse than Ken Martin handled the DNC autopsy. It was a disaster of his own making, and it’s sufficient evidence that he is not the right person to lead the DNC at this time.”

Amanda Litman, founder of the Democratic-allied organization Run For Something, said Martin is “fundamentally not up to the task” and will be “incapable of rebuilding the trust necessary to facilitate a Democratic primary in 2027-2028.” Activist David Hogg also called for Martin’s resignation.

Democratic strategist Steve Schale described the report’s rollout as “an unmitigated s---show,” adding that “there’s just no confidence in the competence in the DNC.”

Key Findings on Campaign Strategy

Beyond the leadership crisis, the report offers several notable findings about the 2024 campaign. It acknowledges that Trump’s anti-transgender ad — “Kamala is for they/them, President Trump is for you” — was “very effective” and that Harris was “boxed in” on the issue, unable to change her position without political cost.

The report also criticizes Democrats’ focus on “identity politics” and warns that the party can no longer assume Latino voters, especially younger Latino men, are a reliable part of their base. “The party needs a complete rethink of its Latino outreach strategy,” it states.

On rural voters, the report is blunt: “You can’t lose rural areas by overwhelming margins and make it up elsewhere when rural voters are a significant share of the electorate. If Democrats are to reclaim leadership in the Heartland or the South, candidates must perform well in rural turf. Show up, listen, and then do it again.”

What Comes Next

The controversy comes at a precarious moment for Democrats, who are preparing for the 2026 midterm elections with hopes of regaining control of Congress. Martin had originally withheld the report to avoid creating a “distraction,” but acknowledged in a Substack post that his strategy backfired: “I didn’t want to create a distraction. Ironically, in doing so, I ended up creating an even bigger distraction. And for that, I sincerely apologize.”

Whether Martin can survive the calls for his resignation remains an open question. Most Democratic operatives believe his job is not in immediate jeopardy ahead of the midterms, but the crisis has exposed deep fractures within the party over strategy, messaging, and leadership — wounds that remain unhealed more than 18 months after Trump’s victory.

As AP News noted, the report’s release did nothing to temper irritation at Martin, and Democratic insiders were exasperated as they spent the day talking about a two-year-old election instead of focusing on Trump’s agenda. For a party desperate to find its footing, the autopsy has become yet another symptom of the dysfunction it was meant to diagnose.