Home Democrats voted Tuesday to maintain their prime management staff in place, voicing overwhelming confidence in Minority Chief Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) and his prime deputies precisely two weeks after a disappointing Election Day relegated them to the minority for one more two years.
In a closed-door assembly within the Capitol basement, rank-and-file Democrats tapped Jeffries to stay the Home minority chief, whereas voting to maintain Rep. Katherine Clark (D-Mass.) as Democratic whip, Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.) as caucus chair and Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) because the vice chair. In addition they voted in Rep. Joe Neguse (D-Colo.) as assistant Democratic chief.
The outcomes had been no shock. All 4 leaders had risen to the highest of the get together in 2023, after former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and her prime deputies — Reps. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) and James E. Clyburn (D-S.C.) — stepped out of energy after nearly 20 years collectively on the helm. The shift marked a generational realignment that many within the caucus had been clamoring for, and the youthful leaders are all fashionable figures who had been anticipated to maintain their management posts within the 119th Congress. None of them confronted a challenger.
If the roster was no shock, nevertheless, the positions they’re going to occupy had been a disappointment. Heading into the Nov. 5 elections, Democrats had excessive hopes of flipping the decrease chamber after two years with out the gavel — a situation that will have put Jeffries, 54, in line to turn out to be the primary Black Speaker in U.S. historical past.
As an alternative, Republicans — fueled by President-elect Trump’s commanding victory over Vice President Harris — clung to energy within the decrease chamber, repelling powerful challenges in a variety of battleground districts whereas selecting off a number of incumbent Democrats to maintain their razor-thin majority within the subsequent Congress.
As of Tuesday, Republicans managed 220 seats within the chamber, whereas Democrats had secured 213, in keeping with Choice Desk HQ. Two seats stay too near name in California, the place GOP Reps. Michelle Metal and John Duarte are preventing neck-and-neck races for reelection.
The outcomes imply that Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and his management staff once more may have little room for GOP defections as they race to maneuver Trump’s bold legislative agenda within the subsequent Congress. In addition they put Democrats in putting distance of retaking the Home in 2026, a midterm cycle when the get together that controls the White Home tends to wrestle on the congressional poll.
Within the meantime, nevertheless, the Democrats will face the uphill climb.
Though Jeffries and his staff have two years of expertise underneath their belts, the subsequent two years will pose a a lot better problem with Trump — not President Biden — within the White Home, and GOP leaders additionally controlling the Senate, the place Democrats have reigned over the previous 4 years.
Jeffries will not be anticipated to have hassle uniting his Democratic caucus towards Trump and his controversial agenda, which incorporates plans for mass deportations of immigrants missing everlasting authorized standing and an growth of tax cuts for the wealthiest Individuals. However from the minority, they’re going to have little energy to dam laws delivered to the ground by Johnson and the bulk Republicans.
The Democrats’ minority standing additionally leaves them powerless, on the committee degree, to research the incoming Trump administration with the enamel of subpoenas. And it means Trump nearly definitely won’t face any impeachment efforts over the subsequent two years, when the Home is managed by a Speaker who rose to energy largely by means of demonstrations of loyalty to Trump.
Certainly, what little leverage the Democrats retain will rely closely on the mathematics within the Senate, the place the Republicans will management 53 seats subsequent yr — seven in need of the 60 wanted to sidestep a Democratic filibuster. Their affect may also lean closely on the prospect that Johnson, who struggled fabulously to unite his feuding GOP convention within the present Congress, may have the identical troubles within the subsequent.
Jeffries, since Election Day, has characterised the Democrats’ efficiency as “bitterly disappointing.” However whereas Democrats had a tough election cycle, usually — dropping the White Home and Senate whereas failing to flip the Home — they vastly outperformed Harris within the decrease chamber, the place all however a handful of the 31 Democratic “front-liners” received reelection.
The efficiency has largely insulated Jeffries and his management staff from the identical scrutiny dealing with Biden, Harris and different Democratic leaders because the get together scrambles to decipher what went flawed — and who’s accountable — as they head anxiously into Trump’s second time period.
Jeffries, one among Trump’s fiercest critics, can be providing an olive department to the incoming president. In his first press convention because the Democrats’ election losses, Jeffries made clear that he is able to work with Republicans “to find bipartisan common ground whenever and wherever possible.”
However he additionally provided a obtrusive caveat, warning that Democrats may also “always push back whenever necessary against far-right extremism that will hurt the American people.” That, he stated, means preventing towards any GOP plans to chop funding for Social Safety, Medicare, Medicaid and ObamaCare whereas battling to guard girls’s reproductive rights.
“We will continue to exercise common sense, we will always try to find common ground, but we will also, also vigorously defend the common good,” he stated.
