By Shane Trejo

The powers atop the Democratic Party are scared of socialist upstarts gaining steam and stopping the party from beating Trump next year

The Democratic Party elite has seen enough of its young upstarts like Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), and Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez (D-MA). They are purging firms and consultants that are willing to work with primary challengers against incumbent Democrats heading into 2020.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) announced last week that they are blacklisting any vendors from work in the party unless they agree to a loyalty oath of sorts indicating that they will not challenge incumbent Democrats.

The form reads as follows: “I understand the above statement that the DCCC will not conduct business with, nor recommend to any of its targeted campaigns, any consultant that works with an opponent of a sitting Member of the House Democratic Caucus.”

The Intercept published an op/ed written by a far-left activist detailing how the restrictive move from the party elite is creating fissures within the grassroots heading into 2020:

“Like many women in their 20s across America, I feel inexplicably hopeful and manifestly seen when I watch Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez take on the stale and insular political dynamics of Washington…

Ocasio-Cortez’s unapologetic energy in Washington cannot be separated from her decision to run against Joe Crowley in Queens, New York. Every action Ocasio-Cortez takes carries the same fearlessness that prompted her not to wait her turn…

Yet instead of embracing Ocasio-Cortez and the fresh path she has opened, the DCCC and other national “Democratic” organizations are wrapping their arms more tightly around the heavily white, male incumbent Democrats in Washington.”

Between this and the disenfranchisement of Bernie Sanders supporters, the grassroots left is beginning to get the picture that the Democratic elite is not on their side. In fact, the Democratic brass treats their constituents in a similar manner that Republican leadership is known to treat theirs.

The New York Times received word in 2014, near the peak of the tea party phenomenon, that “top congressional Republicans and their allies” were working to “deny [Tea Party-backed candidates] any Senate primary victories, cut into their fund-raising and diminish them as a future force in Republican politics.”

“I think we are going to crush them everywhere,” Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said at the time, referring to tea party upstart primary challengers. “I don’t think they are going to have a single nominee anywhere in the country.”

McConnell may have been arrogant but was not wrong in making his boast. With the one lone exception of libertarian economist Dave Brat upending Rep. Eric Cantor in Virginia, every single tea party challenger was put down in 2014. State senator Chris McDaniel came the closest to defeating incumbent Thad Cochran, but lost in a run-off election following extreme corruption. The movement would never quite recover.

“I know this: Politics doesn’t like losers. If you don’t have anything to point to, it is kind of hard to keep it going,” McConnell said of his opposition, kicking dirt into their face while they were down.

The Democratic Party elite hopes to replicate the success that the Republican Party bosses had during the Obama presidency in derailing their ascendant grassroots rebellion, but the far left is very much aware of what is happening and does not plan to go down lightly.

With the civil war ongoing for the soul of the Democratic Party, that does not bode well for their chances in 2020. The extremists in their midst will likely cause great division heading into the presidential election, and that has to be music to President Donald Trump’s ears.