National Journal reports that the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) has adopted new hiring standards, banning the use of any political vendors who are working on campaigns opposing Democratic incumbents: “It is intended to help stymie attempts by insurgent progressive groups who plan to primary incumbents deemed insufficiently liberal on key issues, but also to shield members of the party’s ascendant liberal wing who represent safe Democratic territory and could face intraparty challenges of their own.”

In addition to protecting Democratic incumbents from intraparty challenges, the hiring standards have very interesting diversity requirements for any vendors who want to be hired by Democratic campaigns: “In most cases, the committee will contract only with businesses that meet at least one of five key diversity standards. Among them, it asks potential vendors to report if their firm is at least partially owned by someone who identifies as LGBT, a woman, a minority, a veteran, or a person with disabilities. Other prioritized attributes: if 50 percent of senior staff positions or 60 percent of total staff positions are filled with people in those categories.” The DCCC says that these requirements are so that campaign workers will reflect the diversity of Democratic voters.

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One of the progressive groups that may be affected by these new rules is the Justice Democrats. Read our exclusive article, Do You Know about the Justice Democrats? You Should.