KDP Breaks Rules to Promote Grimes

A fundamental bylaw of the Kentucky Democratic Party prohibits party officials from taking sides in a primary.  If there is more than one Democratic candidate competing, the party is supposed to remain neutral.

For months, while two little-known but courageous Democrats dared to step forward to challenge Mitch McConnell, the KDP pretended they didn't exist, whining to everyone about the need for a Democratic challenger to McConnell while two were already campaigning.

Party officials even worked behind the scenes to sabotage Ashley Judd because she wasn't the candidate they wanted.

Now, while the repug-lite candidate they wanted campaigns as if she didn't have to run in a primary, one of her Democratic opponents is calling foul on the KDP.

Jack Brammer at The Herald:

Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Ed Marksberry thinks his party is not playing fairly with his campaign.

Marksberry, an Owensboro contractor who lost a bid for Congress in 2010, filed a lawsuit Monday in Franklin Circuit Court against state Democratic Party chairman Daniel Logsdon, alleging the party is favoring the candidacy of Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes.

"I love the Democratic Party, but if it keeps on doing what it has been doing, it looks like they're ignoring the working class in the party over the rich," Marksberry said Monday during a telephone interview.

Logsdon did not respond to an email and phone call seeking comment.

Marksberry said in the four-page lawsuit that he was surprised and shocked when the state Democratic Party released an email July 1 about Grimes' announcement of her candidacy and mentioned her fundraising efforts.

Marksberry said the party had declined his request to distribute various announcements about his campaign events through its electronic mailing network. He said he was told that sending such communications would violate the party's bylaws, which prohibit the party from using its assets to endorse or support one Democratic candidate over another Democratic candidate in a Democratic primary election.

The party's email about Grimes was "in violation of the clear and unambiguous language of its bylaws," the suit says. "Clearly, resources of Kentucky Democratic Party were utilized to promote Alison Lundergan Grimes' campaign and denied to supporting the candidacy of Edward Marksberry."

Grimes is going to be the nominee, but she's going to lose every working-class and liberal Democratic voter in the Commonwealth getting there.

Then she's going to lose to McConnell by double-digits, which is exactly what the Kentucky Democratic Party deserves.