The Democratic National Convention opened this evening with a vote to update this year’s party platform to add God and Jerusalem back into the document.
Former Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland, citing his past as a Methodist pastor, offered the amendments to the platform after Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, chairman of the convention, gaveled in the session.
Villaraigosa needed a two-thirds voice vote to adopt the amendments, and asked for votes three times before deciding that the yeas had it. The mayor looked flustered after the second vote and was given advice by a woman who walked onstage before calling for the third vote.
The yeas and the nays gave equally loud shouts of their votes. Boos were heard in the hall on the adoption of the amendments.
The first amendment says that the government should help people “make the most of their God-given potential,” and the second says “Jerusalem is and will remain the capital of Israel.”
“This is a huge embarrassment and it exposes where rank and file Ds are on support for Israel,” tweeted former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer. “A railroad just passed thru the floor of the D convention. No way was that a 2/3rd vote.”
“Thank God, literally, that Ted Strickland repaired the damage from oversights in Dem platform,” Democratic strategist Paul Begala tweeted.
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