DEMOCRATS ELECT FORMER OBAMA LABOR SECRETARY TOM PEREZ AS NATIONAL PARTY CHAIRMAN, PJM reports.

Earlier: DNC chairman’s race deadlocked. “The leading contenders, Rep. Keith Ellison of Minnesota and Tom Perez of Maryland, President Barack Obama’s former labor secretary, failed to clear the 50 percent-plus threshold among the 427 eligible voting members of the Democratic National Committee who voted on first ballot.”

Presumably intense Islamophobia led to Democrats rejecting Ellison. Though to borrow Henry Kissinger’s joke about the Iran-Iraq war, it’s a pity they both couldn’t lose.

As Scott Johnson notes at Power Line, “The mainstream media have followed the race with great intensity. It’s a little hard to fathom until you pause to reflect. They have a deep professional interest in the selection of their new leader.”

Related: ‘Because the Russians’? #DNCChair vote quickly switched from electronic to paper ballots.

Gee, why can’t the rest of us have those as well?