After Democratic losses, a little-known lawmaker wants to lead the party

New York state Sen. James Skoufis announced Saturday what is sure to be a sweeping bid to become chairman of the Democratic National Committee, casting himself as an outsider who has won in a part of the country where President-elect Donald J. Trump has prevailed.

Mr. Skoufis, 37, has served in the New York State Legislature for a dozen years but is virtually unknown outside of Albany and his district, which includes Orange County in the Hudson Valley. He enters the race without extensive relationships with party members outside of New York state – a disadvantage he hopes to turn into an advantage.

“We tried the DC Beltway thing, we tried the decades-long operational thing, we tried this kind of party machine over and over and over again,” Mr. Skoufis said in an interview last week. “And here we are.”

Where Democrats are in Washington, they are locked out of power, facing decades of conservative dominance over the federal courts and seemingly more depressed about Mr. Trump’s impending return to power than motivated to regain political control.

In this environment, a candidate like Mr. Skoufis has little to lose and much to gain by making a positive impression on DNC members—not to mention that it will be much easier to get cast on cable television as a candidate for party chairmanship be considered just a state senator.

Mr. Skoufis, who described himself as both an “outsider” and an “outsider” in an announcement video, is entering the race without a single endorsement from any of the 448 voting members of the National Committee. He joins a field that includes Ken Martin, the Democratic leader of Minnesota, and Martin O’Malley, the former governor of Maryland. Other potential candidates include Wisconsin Democratic Chairman Ben Wikler; Max Rose, a former congressman from Staten Island; and Chuck Rocha, a veteran Democratic consultant.