Like a lot of Democrats, my ears perked up when I heard the DNC had reversed field and released a version of its earlier-suppressed 2024 “autopsy report,” but as I noted at New York, it should have either been completed or deleted:

Complaints among Democratic activists and influencers over the DNC’s decision to abort its 2024 “autopsy report” was based on a craving for two things: (1) a clear “who done it” assessment of blame for Kamala Harris’s loss to Donald Trump, and (2) a clear path forward for the party, in terms of its left-or-center ideological direction and its message to voters.

Now DNC chairman Ken Martin has released an extremely unfinished draft of the “autopsy” report, and those who wanted this to happen are going to be very disappointed — or perhaps even horrified. While the draft written by consultant Paul Rivera offers many granular observations about what went wrong in 2024 and what Democrats need to do going forward, there is neither an assessment nor a prescription that rises to the level of offering clarity to anguished Democratic Party members. Instead, the message that comes through is that Democrats are still processing what happened and what to do about it, but you’ll have to get back to them later for anything the least bit definitive. “Democrats really are in disarray” is the unmistakable takeaway.

To begin, the 192-page draft is literally incomplete, with an executive summary and a conclusion that might have somewhat tied it together entirely missing. Just as important, the released version includes marginal notes from DNC staff that constantly call into question a vast number of the author’s arguments and data points. In case you miss the effort to distance the party from the document, every page carries this disclaimer: “This document reflects the views of the author, not the DNC. The DNC was not provided with the underlying sourcing, interviews, or supporting data for many of the assertions contained herein and therefore cannot independently verify the claims presented.” In other words: Believe this crap at your own risk! Rely on it at your peril!

That’s not to say there’s no value in slogging through the document’s snail’s-eye-view of what happened in 2024; its analysis of Democratic and Republican media strategies, organizational tactics, and fundraising all include some gems, assuming you ignore the DNC disclaimer and trust the data. There are also some broader insights about the Biden White House’s failure to prepare Kamala Harris for the role she was forced to play, the fateful campaign decision against going medieval on Donald Trump’s history, and the success or failure of down-ballot candidates whose strategy and message differed from Harris’s. But it requires an effort to distill real lessons from all the detail.

The decision to release the report in this undressed form is as mystifying as any of our questions about 2024.

Perhaps the most valuable insight in this deeply flawed document is a reminder that Democrats should not take solace in close losses or minimize the long-term challenge they face:

“To grow, we must admit and accept some hard truths about our Party. Since the high point of the 2008 Obama landslide, when he received nearly 10 million more votes than John McCain, the Democratic Party has vacillated between stagnation and retrogression. In doing so, we have lost the confidence we once received from everyday Americans — and election results show it.

“In the sixteen tumultuous years since that historic election, Democrats have lost ground at every level of government. These losses are the direct result of missed opportunities to invest in our states, counties, and local parties and candidates”.

The report also notes that Democrats were in a similar long-term slough before Bill Clinton’s election in 1992. But it’s worth remembering that the party had calamitous losses immediately after both the Clinton and Obama breakthroughs, before recovering to reelect both of them. A true autopsy report would provide a long-term narrative of Democratic wins and losses and how they compare to today’s situation. It’s probably more than Rivera was asked to produce, but it’s nonetheless essential.

The good news for Democrats is that they really don’t need a 2024 autopsy to have a successful 2026 midterm election. All the bad consequences of a Trump return to power that they failed to explain in 2024 are now becoming manifest to a majority of Americans, with or without the opposition party’s efforts to point them out or offer alternatives. Yes, the mechanics Rivera’s report dwells on will matter at the margins, but midterms are inherently a referendum on presidential job performance, and no president has more forcefully made politics all about himself than Donald Trump.

A true 2024 autopsy will be most valuable after the midterms, when the 2028 election cycle gets underway. But even then, it’s the Democratic presidential candidate who will have to bring the party out of its current disarray and provide ideological, strategic, and tactical direction, just as Bill Clinton and Barack Obama did in 1992 and 2008. The next true Democratic Party leader won’t be Ken Martin or his successors or Democratic congressional leaders, but the person who succeeds Kamala Harris (or perhaps Harris herself). Getting that choice right will mean more to the party’s future than any report, finished or half-finished, that anyone can devise. As autopsy contributor Rob Flaherty told New York’s Ben Hart recently, Democrats have a very basic “brand” problem. There’s still time for a rebranding, but it needs to begin this November.