I don't see what's wrong with her ideas, at least in principle.
In the UK, the Labour Party, of which I'm a member, is in the process of choosing a new leader.
Obviously the process wouldn't map directly, since the political system is very different, but it's a three- stage procedure whereby candidates first have to secure nominations from a sufficient number of Labour Members of Parliament (15% I think, from memory), and those who do, then have to secure sufficient nominations from affiliated trades unions, socialist societies and constituency Labour Parties, and only then do those who have secured sufficient nominations at these two stages go on to a ballot of the whole party membership.
The system is far from perfect, but I see nothing wrong in having a selection procedure that ensures candidates for the party leader enjoy the support of the people they hope to lead -- MPs, party activists and affiliated organisations -- before being chosen by the party membership.
Part of the problem is that there is no legal role for parties in our government. Everything that exists is a result of traditions and
ad hoc decisions made to solve problems that probably don't exist any more.
When the Constitution was written, there were no formal parties in the Continental Congress because (1) each state had one vote, so divisions within state delegations were often more pronounced than differences between states, (2) while colonial governments had similar parties to England before the Revolution, the Tories were the Loyalist party and therefore were effectively wiped out by the end of the war, with most prominent Tories leaving for Britain or other parts of the Empire, and (3) given the weakness of the Continental Congress, most partisan issues were questions resolved in the State assemblies. So while there were political differences, there were no effective parties on the national level.
By creating an Executive branch that was entirely unconnected to the election of the Legislative branches, the Framers hoped to prevent the kinds of partisan conflict that they were familiar with from their experience with English government from becoming part of the new Federal government. There hope was that the various state methods of choosing Electors for the President as well as the Senators would reduce partisanship as only the House of Representatives was elected directly, and they had no role in confirming Cabinet positions.
Obviously that failed. While Washington was elected by consensus and reelected, during his administration the debate over the strength and scope of activities of the Federal government led to formation of the Federalist and Democratic-Republican parties, and the state political parties generally fell in line with the national parties.
It didn't take long for parties to assume important roles in the political process, but the only adjustment made was to separate the ballots for President and Vice President in the Electoral College (originally, each Elector cast two votes, and winner became President, second place Vice President, with ties leading to separate House and Senate votes) to fix the problem of 1796 (President and Vice President from different parties) and 1800 (where the House took 36 ballots to elect Jefferson over his running mate Aaron Burr).
So all of that is a short preface to why there is no legal role for our parties in the elections, and hence there are no official party "leaders" in the sense that most Parliamentary democracies have them. The national party organizations are support organizations that channel money and resources to candidates. They can pick which races to prioritize, but they are not supposed to be involved in primary elections. So the heads of the DNC and RNC are hired by consensus of party leaders but their role is not to formulate policy or enforce order.
We don't have a Governing and Opposition role, so there is no direct tie between party leaders and specific roles. Usually the highest officeholder of each party is said to be the leader (currently President Trump and Speaker Pelosi) but there is no official process designating them as such and they can be usurped by people with more resources or party connections. As for local party "members" we don't really have those in the sense that Parliamentary democracies do, either. In some states, you have to register with a party preference to vote for candidates ion that party's primaries, but in others you can request either ballot at the polls. Candidates usually need to have a number of signatures to qualify for the ballot, but the bar is low and there is no check by the parties to determine if they follow any portions of the platform (established at State and National party conventions where usually precinct-level official participate). The whole idea of who belongs to or is a member of a party is nebulous at best. Simply put, there is no one here to consult the way parties in the UK do.
And the idea that the Presidential candidate is determined by the outcome of Primary elections is pretty new here. The first Presidential primary was in 1912. Up until the 1970s, state parties had more power in determining the outcome than vote totals. Before that, elites were the people who selected candidates, but the process was unclear and the roles were more about power and influence than any official title. It was corrupt as hell.
Apologies. I had a few more tangents to go off on, but the short answer is we don't have the kind of party structure that allows the vetting used in places like the UK.
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