The Democratic National Committee on Thursday released a nearly 200-page draft of an internal autopsy of what went wrong in the 2024 campaign, ending months of speculation that had emerged as an embarrassing public spectacle for the party as it seeks to regain control of Congress.
The report places blame for Kamala Harris’s defeat partly on former President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s political operation, arguing that it failed to position her for success in the race after he dropped out. It also critiques the Harris campaign for failing to distance itself from Mr. Biden, and for failing to mount an effective strategy to make a dent in Donald Trump’s rising approval ratings.
The release, first reported by CNN, was an extraordinary turn of events for the party, which all but trashed its own report as incomplete and inaccurate, releasing the document only after months of mounting headaches from keeping it secret.
Atop each page was a bright red disclaimer that the D.N.C. “was not provided with the underlying sourcing, interviews, or supporting data for many of the assertions contained herein.” A page with the section title, “Executive Summary,” was blank with a note in red reading: “This section was not provided by author.”
Ken Martin, the party chairman, had tapped a longtime ally, Paul Rivera, to oversee the creation of the autopsy. But Mr. Rivera’s final product was “wasn’t ready for primetime. Not even close,” Mr. Martin wrote on Thursday.
The document is disorganized and leaves empty entire sections, including those devoted to conclusions. But it does include a number of revelations, such as the fact that before the 2022 midterms the White House had directed the party to poll on how Dr. Jill Biden, the first lady, could help her president — but that there had been no such polling on Ms. Harris.
It also describes sobering polling data that showed how pro-Trump advertising criticizing Ms. Harris for past comments about transgender individuals had been highly effective, with no answer offered by the her campaign to counter it.
For months, Mr. Martin had resisted calls to release the report because, he said, he did not wish it to be a distraction from efforts to win seats in the midterm elections. But in recent weeks, the discourse about the autopsy itself — combined with the party’s pallid financial state — had ballooned into a sideshow that threatened to upend the national committee’s electoral priorities and prompted public and private calls for Mr. Martin to leave his post.
On Wednesday, the D.N.C.’s latest financial report showed it was more than $3 million in debt. The Republican National Committee had $123 million on hand and no debt.
Mr. Martin on Thursday apologized for his mishandling of the autopsy.
“In short, I didn’t want to create a distraction,” he wrote in a long Substack post on Thursday. “Ironically, in doing so, I ended up creating an even bigger distraction. And for that, I sincerely apologize.”
