Nicole Gaudiano

USA TODAY





Supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders’ have launched an online campaign for the immediate resignation of Donna Brazile as interim chair of the Democratic National Committee.

Former Sanders delegates to the Democratic National Convention voted 337-13 in favor of Brazile’s resignation in a straw poll, conducted by the independent Bernie Delegates Network. The online activist group RootsAction.org, which sponsors the network, launched a petition Monday shortly after the votes were tallied.

The petition follows revelations that Brazile, as a political analyst for CNN, gave Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign advance notice of questions that would be asked during a Democratic primary debate between Clinton and Sanders, a Vermont independent. Brazile, who was DNC vice chair at the time, resigned from CNN last month and a CNN spokeswoman said the network is "completely uncomfortable" with what it learned about her interactions with the Clinton campaign from emails released by Wikileaks.

“Like Debbie Wasserman Schultz before her, Brazile has lost credibility as an honest broker at the Democratic National Committee,” Norman Solomon, coordinator of the Network and co-founder RootsAction.org wrote in an opinion piece for The Hill. “The DNC chair should be evenhanded — but, thanks to leaked emails, Brazile’s cover is blown.”

Brazile said on SiriusXM that her “conscience, as an activist, a strategist...is very clear” but that she would “know a hell of a lot more about cybersecurity” if she had to do it over again. She took over as the DNC’s interim chair after Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida stepped down as chairwoman over leaked emails revealing earlier DNC attempts to undermine Sanders' presidential campaign.

The DNC follows a process for electing new officers, but hasn't announced the details yet for this cycle. Reached via email, Brazile wrote, "as Interim Chair, I will follow precedent."

Sanders hasn’t taken a position on Brazile, but he's actively campaigning for Rep. Keith Ellison, co-chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, and one of two Muslims in the House, to lead the DNC. He launched a petition last week for Ellison that received more than 250,000 signatures in 24 hours.

“That sounds to me like people want a political revolution at the DNC and that they want the Democratic Party to move in a very different direction,” Sanders wrote to his supporters Friday.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and the Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York, who is expected to take over Reid’s position next Congress, also endorsed Ellison, who announced his candidacy for the post on Monday.

Former presidential candidate and Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, who led the party from 2005-2009, is also running for the position, but he said Monday on MSNBC’s Morning Joe that it’s “not something I’m going to push people out of the way for.”