Pennsylvania state Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta on swearing-in day Jan. 7, 2025. (Capital-Star/Peter Hall)
State Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta (D-Philadelphia) wants the Democratic Party to get back to basics. That’s why he’s running for Democratic Party National Committee (DNC) vice chair.
“I’m not a Democrat because I hate Republicans,” Kenyatta told the Capital-Star. “I’m a Democrat because I believe the Democratic Party at its best is best positioned to actually deliver the important progress that working families need.”
Kenyatta is one of the 14 candidates vying for three vice chair positions with the DNC. The 34-year-old lawmaker was first elected in 2018 to represent parts of North Philadelphia in the Pennsylvania General Assembly.
He told the Capital-Star that Democrats “can’t exist as a foil to somebody else” for the next four years.
“We cannot be the party of billionaires and the party of the people working for the billionaires,” he said. “I choose being the party of workers, of working people, of people who know what it means to get up every day, work their hearts out and still not have everything that they deserve.”
Kenyatta was an early supporter of President Joe Biden’s candidacy in 2020 and delivered a speech at the Democratic National Convention in 2024 where he blasted Project 2025, a conservative policy roadmap.
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Kenyatta sees the volunteer vice chair position as an extension of the work he’s doing as a legislator and believes that the messaging from the Democratic Party moving forward is “not locked in the brain of some high-priced consultant.”
“They are locked in the lived experience of working families like mine, who want to believe, again, that there are people in government that actually give a damn about them, and I think that that was the trouble for us in this election,” Kenyatta said.
Democrats suffered losses in Pennsylvania and beyond in 2024. With Donald Trump at the top of the ticket, Republicans carried Pennsylvania’s 19 electoral votes and won the races for U.S. Senate and the three row offices. That includes the auditor general race in which Kenyatta was the candidate. He lost to incumbent Tim DeFoor.
Kenyatta said that messaging is one of the issues the Democratic Party needs to address.
“The Democratic Party has not been effective at communicating in this very splintered media environment,” Kenyatta said. He said Democrats took too long to engage with voters on TikTok, podcasts, and streaming platforms, and should have spent time appearing on outlets serving conservative audiences.
“I think unfortunately, we have allowed other people to tell Democrats who we are, and to tell people who Democrats are,” he said. “Democrats have to be communicating everywhere and telling our own message and talking about the things that we did, and I think that that leads to the second thing I would say is that we do not spike the ball enough.”
Kenyatta said the Biden-Harris administration cutting the cost of insulin was an example of a win the Democratic Party should have touted better to average Americans.
He’s also concerned about voter registration efforts in the party. Democrats’ voter registration advantage over Republicans in Pennsylvania has dwindled over the past decade. Kenyatta wants Democrats to lead the single largest voter registration operation in American history.
“That’s a big statement, but that is a big thing we must do,” he said.
Kenyatta also believes his experience as a local elected official and being from Pennsylvania are assets for the DNC role.
“I’ve known the joy of success, I’ve known the pain of falling short,” Kenyatta said.
Despite the losses in Pennsylvania, Democrats maintained their one seat majority in the state House, an example of where the party did well in 2024, he said.
“We have to be about electing people up and down the ballot, listening to candidates on the ground,” Kenyatta said.
The DNC is hosting its first virtual forum on Saturday for new candidates for chair, vice chair, and other roles within the national party. DNC members will select their new leaders on Feb. 1.
Even though Trump hasn’t even taken the oath of office yet for his second term, Kenyatta thinks too many people are already focused on future presidential elections in the party.
“F**k what we do in four years. What are we going to do in 10 months?,” Kenyatta said, citing key races in New Jersey and Virginia.
“I believe in the Democratic Party, and I believe that this moment can be a moment that we reinvent ourselves, that we rebuild. It doesn’t have to be the moment that we write the obituary of the Democratic Party. It’s the moment that we tell the next chapter and tell the new story of a Democratic party that is laser focused on one thing, one thing only. How do we make life better for working people and working families?”
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