The Democratic Party is so short on cash that leaders at its headquarters have undertaken a new gambit to mask the severity of the problems: asking vendors not to send bills until after the midterm elections.

The bookkeeping maneuver, which was described by three people briefed on it, is the latest sign of financial duress for the Democratic National Committee and its embattled leader as money troubles threaten to undercut Democratic momentum with 100 days until the midterms.

So much is going politically right for Democrats these days. President Trump’s approval is down, gas prices are up and an unpopular war with Iran drags on. But dysfunction and debt inside one of the party’s key institutions — which is getting crushed in fund-raising by its Republican counterpart — are creating rising anxiety for top Democrats.

At the center is Ken Martin, the 53-year-old party chairman, who has found himself increasingly isolated, gripped by the fear that he will lose his job and relying on a vanishingly small circle of people he trusts, according to interviews with more than two dozen Democrats, including current and former D.N.C. officials and members. Most of them spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the party’s troubled state of affairs.

Mr. Martin’s fraying nerves are showing. In a pique of frustration in early July, he threw his phone at the desk of a junior aide while upbraiding the person. The phone-tossing incident resulted in a formal complaint to the D.N.C.’s human resources department.

The fallout from the phone-throwing episode was described by half a dozen people familiar with the incident, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss internal party matters. None of them witnessed the encounter, and there was some dispute over how aggressively the phone was tossed. Mr. Martin was said to have thrown the phone at the desk, rather than at the aide.

Mr. Martin later met with D.N.C. human resources officials about his behavior, according to three of the people.

The Democratic National Committee declined to comment on the incident. Mr. Martin declined an interview request. Roger Lau, the executive director of the D.N.C., said in a statement that the bill-deferral discussions were “nothing more than standard negotiations with vendors over contracts and payment processes.”

Around the office and beyond, Mr. Martin has taken to making macabre jokes to colleagues about how long he will remain in his post, even though his term does not end until 2029. He is frustrated with the tarnished public image of a party that he plainly loves and has devoted his life to — and that remains bullish about November given President Trump’s low approval ratings.

But the Democratic Party and its allies are far behind Republicans when it comes to money. Mr. Trump controls a $400 million super PAC, and the Republican National Committee is sitting on nearly $130 million. Mr. Martin’s D.N.C. is $2 million in debt.

The committee’s role is not just to help Democrats win back power in the midterms, but also to lead the party into the 2028 presidential race, including by overseeing a new primary calendar while organizing debates and a national convention.

Even supporters acknowledge Mr. Martin’s growing sense of paranoia. He confronted the party’s finance director this spring over what he thought was a budding coup. And before he met with the top congressional Democrats, Senator Chuck Schumer of New York and Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York, in mid-July, assurances were given to an ally of Mr. Martin’s that the two party leaders did not plan to use the gathering to call for the chairman’s resignation.

Mr. Martin was elected last February to a four-year term by the roughly 450 members of the D.N.C., and only a vote of the membership itself could push him out.

Trust in Mr. Martin — among both donors and party officials — was sapped by his handling of a long-promised autopsy of the 2024 election. Late last year, he said he would not release the document. But as criticism mounted, he relented in May and released an incomplete draft that featured searing annotations from the D.N.C. that undermined the report.

In public, Mr. Martin has all but disappeared as a face of the party on television ever since a fumbling April appearance on the liberal podcast Pod Save America, when he faced questions about why he had not released the autopsy. His lone television interview in recent months was on local news in Erie, Pa.

Now, Mr. Martin is both paralyzed by the idea of leaks and surrounded by them. During a May meeting with the full staff of the D.N.C. days after the draft autopsy’s release, he admitted that times were tough and chided the team for revealing to reporters what was happening inside party headquarters.

“It pisses me off when I see leaks out of this building,” Mr. Martin said, according to four people who heard the remarks, adding, “No more.”

Mr. Martin said he saw “a lot of down faces” and “people hanging their heads.” He urged: “Keep your head up. Keep a smile on your face.”

“My success is your success,” he added at another point in the meeting. “So the weaker I am, the weaker all of you are.”

Mr. Martin has not addressed the entire party staff since.

This week, he personally drafted an essay of more than 3,000 words defending the state of the D.N.C.’s finances. He held the essay closely, and it was posted jointly by the party and his personal Substack, under the @kenmartin287890 handle, just after 10 p.m. on Monday.

“We must measure success by power built, not simply dollars retained,” he wrote.

Cash Crunch

None of the party’s problems are more acute than money.

For more than a decade, the D.N.C. has transferred millions of dollars every election to sister committees responsible for winning the House and Senate. But the national party is now so short on cash — even after taking out a $15 million loan last year — that officials have privately conveyed to congressional leadership that there will be no such transfers in 2026.

The main topic of the meeting this month with Mr. Schumer and Mr. Jeffries, along with their top aides and the chairs of the two congressional campaign arms, was forming a huge new shared fund-raising account across the three national committees — and state parties across the country.

Even as the political environment has eroded for Republicans, money remains a serious concern for Democrats. Republican Party committees are far more flush than Democratic ones — just as a recent Supreme Court ruling made party cash more important by lifting restrictions on how parties can coordinate with campaigns.

Inside the room, Mr. Martin described a proposal in which much of the cash raised through this mega committee — which would include state parties nationwide — would be routed first through his committee before being distributed to the congressional party arms.

At least some involved saw the move as a bid to inflate the fund-raising figures of Mr. Martin’s struggling committee — and to take credit for cash transfers he could not otherwise afford.

Mr. Martin offered to do whatever was helpful, though the group left without an agreement. The meeting, which has not been previously reported, was described by five people, including some in the room, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a private gathering.

New financial reports released this week revealed the depth of the D.N.C.’s financial hole. The party is $2 million in debt, while the Republican National Committee has $128.5 million in cash on hand. The party that holds the White House almost always raises more money into its party coffers, but this year’s chasm is extraordinarily large.

Ahead of the D.N.C.’s July report, there were signs of trying to brighten the appearance of the books. The committee, for instance, transferred $1 million from an account dedicated to the 2028 national convention back to the party.

Some of the problems are a hangover from 2024. While Vice President Kamala Harris raised record sums that year, her loss left many big Democratic donors disillusioned with the party. Her campaign also had millions in debt that the D.N.C. spent much of last year paying off, with Ms. Harris’s help.

Last fall, Mr. Martin sent $3 million each to Democrats in Virginia and New Jersey for their governor’s races, betting that victories would reinvigorate fund-raising for the D.N.C. The $15 million loan was timed to allow those transfers.

The D.N.C. has since paid more than $700,000 in interest on that loan, averaging more than $75,000 per month, federal records show. Party officials are now reckoning with the fact that they must begin to repay $1.66 million of the loan’s principal per month starting in January, according to the loan’s terms.

“Ken needs help — H-E-L-P,” said Donna Brazile, a veteran D.N.C. member who has twice served as acting party chair. “And if he’s reluctant to say it, I’m here to help him ask. It’s hard. It’s very difficult.”

Tense Talks

The same day that Mr. Martin spoke at the all-staff meeting in May, he urgently tried to get in touch with the party’s finance chairman, Chris Korge.

Mr. Korge had been speaking with other senior party officers about a potential emergency meeting to discuss the party’s sagging finances. Hearing about the calls, Mr. Martin seemed to fear that a coup was afoot.

They connected late one Tuesday night.

“It started off extremely heated,” Mr. Korge recalled of their conversation. “Because he came into that call thinking my intention was motivated to take some sort of action to remove him, and that was the furthest thing from the truth.”

Word of the confrontation, which has not previously been reported, spread across the senior ranks of the party. Mr. Korge now describes it as simply “a family fight” that was resolved amicably by the end of the call. “I have believed in Ken’s priorities from Day 1 for the party,” he said.

The meeting of top party officers that Mr. Korge had wanted took place in Pittsburgh in June. There, they were presented for the first time with nondisclosure agreements, which Axios has previously reported.

The NDAs were yet another sign of Mr. Martin’s narrowing circle of trust.

Strategy Doubts

Before Mr. Martin ascended to the national party chairmanship in early 2025, he had served for 14 years as the head of the Minnesota Democrats, during which time his party never lost a statewide race.

Inside the D.N.C., he led the state party chairs group. The alliances he forged there helped him overcome opposition from prominent Democrats in Washington, including Mr. Schumer and Mr. Jeffries, to win the national party post.

Mr. Martin knew the new job would be hard, frequently making a joke comparing his role to a fire hydrant and everyone else to a dog.

But Mr. Martin believes deeply in handing money and relinquishing power to the states. He increased their monthly allotments from the national party, especially in red states, and last year sent an extra $100,000 to Mississippi Democrats before a special election that broke a legislative Republican supermajority.

“We were able to — with the extra help our candidates needed — get over the finish line,” said Mikel Bolden, the executive director of the Mississippi Democratic Party, crediting Mr. Martin.

Mr. Martin and his allies frequently note that fund-raising has been stronger than the last time the party was out of power in 2018.

But some Democrats, both inside and outside the committee, are questioning where exactly all the money has gone.

The single biggest expense in the Martin era was $7.3 million to buy the remnants of Ms. Harris’s campaign list from her failed 2024 bid. Ms. Harris’s political action committee used the money to cover additional remaining debts.

Mr. Martin’s pledge to increase monthly handouts to state parties has been the centerpiece of his spending agenda. But his inclusion of the territories has caused consternation.

Spending from the D.N.C. and an affiliated fund-raising committee for Guam, Puerto Rico, the Northern Marianas, the Virgin Islands and American Samoa has reached about $840,000 since the beginning of last year, federal records show — far more than in the past.

None of those territories will have any impact on control of Congress.