It appears that the private political consultant NGP VAN is in the process of self-immolation.
The for profit manages the vast bulk of the lists and IT infrastructure for the Democratic Party nationwide, and now it has been taken over by the private equity firm Apax, who are now setting about laying off a significant portion of NGP VAN's employees.
I am sure some of you are wondering, "Why would anyone with a speck of common sense in a political party allow critical infrastructure and databases to become the property of a for profit firm when that firm did not generate this information in the first place?"
My first (Somewhat tongue in cheek) answer is that the Venn diagram of Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment) and, "Anyone with a speck of common sense in a political party," is an empty set.
My second (Somewhat more serious) answer is that if these functions were kept in the official party infrastructure, then you could not have insiders in the Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment) using the revolving door to secure excessive remuneration from the private firm.
If you are working for the DNC, or the DCCC, or the DSCC, senior executives are not going to get high six-figure salaries.
It's all about the looting, baby:
Less than two years after a British private equity firm acquired the campaign tech firm that holds the Democratic Party’s most sensitive data, the new parent company laid off at least 140 people.
In a companywide email on January 12, Mark Layden, the chief executive of Bonterra, the new merged company created by the private equity firm, notified staff that, in its pursuit of “long-term, efficient growth,” 10 percent of the company would be let go. Within the next several minutes, people who were laid off received emails telling them that they no longer had a job. Numerous employees shared their experiences on social media.
“Went to get coffee, by the time I came back to my comp I was locked out of all of the systems,” one Bonterra employee wrote on Twitter. “Folks lose jobs everyday but there was a better way. This was just tacky and apathetic.” Even some of those who kept their jobs announced their dissatisfaction; one tweeted the lack of warning was “just incredibly vile.”
What a bunch of untitled (and incompetent, but that's not a subject for today) assholes.
What the Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment) should do right now is make sure that they get their data, pronto, but instead, they will wring their hands and keep paying money to a company that is being run into the ground. (Actually quite a feat, since they were already underground because of their "vaunted" incompetence)
At NGP VAN — one of the two major organizations that run the Democratic Party’s vaunted organizing, voter file, and compliance tools — and EveryAction, the fundraising software company it operates under, some 40 people lost their jobs in the layoffs.
………
The cost cutting could have unintended consequences for the Democratic Party, said progressive strategist Gabe Tobias.
“There are no nefarious purposes necessarily, like that they don’t want Democrats to win,” he said. “I don’t think they care. But what happens if they just start degrading service? No one can do anything about it. Everything sits inside of VAN, and almost everyone uses the other services they have.”
While NGP VAN was one of the companies merged into Bonterra during the private equity purchase, it remained a standalone brand and has the monopoly on campaign tools and compliance reporting software for the Democratic Party, including its database of coveted Democratic National Committee voter file information. Loyal Democrats in the NGP VAN orbit fear the job cuts — across NGP VAN and EveryAction’s product, data services, client support, and sales departments — could hamper the entire party’s efforts.
This is why you don't fucking privatize core functions or an organization. Eventually the looting, or as Cory Doctorow calls it, "Enshittification," will come back to bite you.
The ownership of these databases is unclear, but it appears to me that the Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment) is in for a world of hurt.
This was foreseeable, but so long as the gravy train, paid for by duped Democratic Party donors, continued, no one cared.
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