It appears that House Democrats will nominate Nancy Pelosi for two more years as president, but she will lead a smaller majority divided along ideological lines as she tries to steer President-elect Joe Biden’s agenda toward enactment.
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Pelosi, a California Democrat, did not face any announced rival for the office on Wednesday, as House Democrats planned their first virtual leadership elections in response to the pandemic. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Maryland, and No. 3 Party Leader Jim Clyburn, DS.C., were also on track to maintain their positions.
“Let us all be advocates of unity in the Democratic Party, where our values are opportunity and community,” Pelosi wrote to Democrats this week.
Pelosi, the first female speaker, has gained widespread recognition among Democrats as the main enemy of outgoing President Donald Trump in the battles for impeachment, immigration and healthcare. She has given the best she has received from the name-calling-prone president, sometimes directly to her face, prompting him to call her “crazy Nancy” and his supporters created memes and action figures in honor of her.
But with some votes still counted in this month’s election, 10 sitting House Democrats have been defeated, frustrating expectations of adding seats and hurting party morale. Democrats were on track to have perhaps a 222-213 majority, one of the smallest in decades.
This has sparked accusations, and progressives say the party failed to adequately win over minorities and young liberal voters. The moderates say they were hurt by far-left initiatives such as defunding the police and that Pelosi should have reached a pre-election stimulus deal with the White House.
In addition to bitterness over the election setback, many Democrats continue to call for new leadership. Pelosi and Hoyer have been the No. 1 and No. 2 Democrats in the House of Representatives since 2003, while Clyburn rose to third place in 2007. Pelosi and Clyburn are 80 years old, Hoyer 81.
However, without a plausible rival, Pelosi seemed headed for what would be her seventh and eight years as a speaker. It served the first four during the 2000s until Republicans regained a majority in the House in the 2010 Tea Party elections, a conservative uprising that heralded the rise of Trump.
In an indication of her strength, a Tory Democrat who had opposed Pelosi before said he hoped she would be re-elected and said he could support her this time.
“I think he gets it,” Rep. Kurt Schrader, D-Oregon, who said he has spoken with Pelosi about the need for a moderate agenda, said in an interview. “She can be the bulwark against the extreme left.”
Schrader said that far-left progressives have been “toxic to our brand” by favoring policies that he says cost jobs. “We cannot continue to speak disdainfully to people and just talk about identity politics,” he said.
House Democrats also voted Wednesday and Thursday in lower leadership positions.
Pelosi only needs a majority of the roughly 222 Democrats in the House of Representatives to be renamed as the party’s presidential candidate. It was possible that Wednesday’s vote was by acclamation, forgoing the secret ballot established by party rules.
“I think it’s smooth sailing,” said Rep. Jamie Raskin, Democrat of Maryland, a supporter of Pelosi. “We have maintained our majority, but it is scarce. But I don’t think anyone is foolish enough to take advantage of the situation. “
When the new Congress meets in early January and the House elects its new president, Pelosi will need a majority of the votes cast by both parties. With nearly all Republicans expected to back their leader, Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-California, Pelosi can afford to lose only a few Democrats.
When Pelosi got the support she needed to become a speaker in 2018, she said she had accepted a proposal limiting her to serve until 2022 only. Several lawmakers and aides said memories of that commitment could lessen her opposition this time.
Also helping Pelosi is the decision by Rep. Cheri Bustos, D-Illinois, to step aside as chair of the Democratic political arm of the House of Representatives.
Some Democrats have criticized the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee for insufficiently protecting the moderate Democratic rulers of swing districts. They are also unhappy that the committee failed to detect the large number of Republican voters Trump drew to the polls, which was ignored by Republican and independent pollsters alike.
“Having Trump on the ballot in ’20 was very different than not having him on the ballot in ’18,” said Rep. Don Beyer, D-Virginia, another Pelosi supporter.
When Democrats took back the House in 2018, 32 of them voted against Pelosi’s nomination as president. But that was a larger majority than this, which gave him more room for error at the time.
By the time the full House elected her in January 2019, she had reduced her opposition and only 13 Democrats voted against her or voted “present.”
Of the 13 Democrats who opposed Pelosi in 2019, two were defeated and one, Rep. Jeff Van Drew of New Jersey, became a Republican. That leaves 10 Democrats who voted against him, although another, Anthony Brindisi of New York, may still lose his election.
Pelosi has pushed through bills in the House, which died in the GOP-ruled Senate, incorporating Democratic priorities to review ethics and campaign finance laws, reduce health care costs and rebuild infrastructure. It has also been a prodigious fundraiser for the candidates.
To prevent lawmakers from unsafe huddling in one room, Democratic leadership candidates were making comments to scattered lawmakers using Zoom, the online meeting platform. Republicans met Tuesday in a packed hotel ballroom and re-elected their current leadership team.
Democrats’ votes were being cast in a new app designed to keep the process secure through the use of encryption.
In a test held Tuesday, Democrats voted for their favorite musician of all time. Her pick by a wide margin: The Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin.
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