This is something I ran across just yesterday in Glenn Hurowitz’s Fear and Courage in the Democratic Party about the DSCC’s reaction to Sen. Paul Wellstone’s opposition to the Iraq AUMF. It’s prior to Schumer’s stint as chair of the DSCC, but I think it exemplifies some of my misgivings about the organization, no matter who is in charge there (at the time, it was Patty Murray of Washington, who voted against the AUMF but wasn’t up for reelection in 2002):
Despite Wellstone’s instructions to leave politics out of the decision [about the AUMF vote], they inevitably reared their ugly head. On September 16 [2002], campaign manager Jeff Blodgett received an email from a senior Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee staffer implying that if Wellstone voted against the war resolution, it could impact the DSCC’s willingness to give Wellstone the financial resources he needed to win. It “makes me almost physically ill to even contemplate our spending 9m [$9 million] on a candidate who decides to commit [political] suicide [by voting against the Iraq war] — however principled and otherwise defensible,” the official wrote.