UPDATE (Nov. 30, 2022, 11:45 a.m. E.T.): House Democrats on Wednesday elected Rep. Hakeem Jeffries as party leader, making him the first Black lawmaker to head a party in Congress.
After years of speculation, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York officially announced his bid to become the new leader of the House Democrats on Friday. In a letter to his colleagues, Jeffries promised to focus on empowering every member, prioritizing security in the face of political violence, and reclaiming the majority in 2024.
That Jeffries was the top candidate to replace outgoing Speaker Nancy Pelosi atop the caucus was an open secret. Unlike Pelosi, whose bid to lead her generation of House Democrats faced competition from her future deputy Steny Hoyer, Jeffries will ascend to the position of minority leader without a fight. He’ll also do it with less than half the experience in Congress that Pelosi had when she was elected to a leadership role in 2002. And with only a handful of seats separating him from the speaker’s gavel, Jeffries doesn’t have long to learn how to fill Pelosi’s shoes.
What’s striking about Jeffries is just how aggressively pragmatic he is. I don’t mean that just in terms of policy, though he does tend to favor more incremental changes than the party’s left wing does. I mean that he seems to deliberately place himself in the center of the caucus, almost to the point of contradiction.
What’s striking about Jeffries is just how aggressively pragmatic he is.
Jeffries is a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, same as the likes of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, also of New York. But over the past few years, he’s clashed with Ocasio-Cortez and her allies — often loudly and publicly. He’s a co-founder of the True Blue PAC, which is dedicated to protecting incumbent Democrats from getting primaried by more progressive candidates. One of his closest allies in the House is Rep. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey, a prominent member of the fiscally conservative Blue Dog Democrats caucus.
Is that the sort of thing I personally want to see from the head of the Democratic caucus? No. But I can appreciate that this instinct could wind up serving Jeffries well in the current Congress. Because the thing that will make or break Jeffries is his ability to negotiate on two fronts: among Democrats and with the GOP House majority.








