California Rep. Nancy Pelosi repelled a challenge to her leadership position last week but the discontent that compelled Ohio’s Tim Ryan to take her on amid much hand-wringing by House Democrats about their dismal performance on Election Day is far from finished.
“I’m afraid a lot of the reforms that we’re seeing are pretty much cosmetic,” said Democratic Rep. Ron Kind of Wisconsin. “You know, getting a few more younger voices at the table for policy and steering. Well, great, but unless you really get at the heart of it, which is committee assignments and committee leadership roles, it seems more same old same old.”
Kind was referring to internal House Democratic Caucus changes that Pelosi had allowed in order to placate Ryan and rebellion leaders Reps. Ruben Gallego of Arizona, Seth Moulton of Massachusetts and Kathleen Rice of New York.
“I’m a big believer in making sure the blood’s circulating around here,” Kind said, arguing that House Democrats need less senior members in leadership positions. “I’ve been one of the leading advocates for term limits on committees. That helps generate that new leadership.
“I think it’s one of the best things they did in their conference is term-limiting … we outta learn from that,” Kind said about House Republican Conference rules that limit members from being the top Republican on a panel for more than six years.
Members can seek, and some have been granted, waivers to exceed the limit but since imposing it in 1994, Republicans have mostly kept to it.
Among the changes Pelosi endorsed was making the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chairmanship an elected position, rather than one appointed by the Democratic leader and ratified by the caucus. A freshman lawmaker, in this case Hawaii’s Colleen Hanabusa, will represent incoming lawmakers and three new co-chairmen who have served fewer than five terms in Congress will be added to the Democratic Policy and Communications Committee roster on Monday.
Those are all steps in the right direction but not enough, many Democrats say.
“I do think it is time for us to bring in younger people in leadership,” Missouri’s Emanuel Cleaver told MSNBC last week. “In fact, if we don’t, I think it will spell the demise of the Democratic Caucus if we’re not already permanently in a state of smallness.”
The House’s top three Democrats — Pelosi, Maryland’s Steny Hoyer and South Carolina’s James Clyburn — are all in their 70s. Pelosi and Hoyer have run the show since 2003.
None of them have been willing to step aside to allow some of the younger members to advance, Jim Manley, a long-time Senate leadership aide who now heads the communications practice at QGA Public Affairs, said.
The lack of upward mobility has caused many rising stars to leave the House, even ones Pelosi seemed to be grooming to someday replace her.
Rep. Xavier Becerra’s decision to accept Gov. Jerry Brown’s appointment as California’s attorney general last week was widely interpreted as an acknowledgement that the term-limited House Democratic Caucus chairman felt he had nowhere to go in the 115th Congress and beyond. He even forewent a chance to become the ranking Democrat on the powerful Ways and Means Committee to exit.
Former DCCC Chairman Steve Israel is retiring at year’s end. In 2014 Pelosi created the position of policy and communications committee chairman to reward the New Yorker but it wasn’t enough to entice him to stay. Ditto with Maryland’s Chris Van Hollen. Pelosi rewarded his successful tenure at the DCCC helm by creating an “assistant to the speaker” position when Democrats took control of the House in 2009. He opted to seek the Free State’s open Senate seat this year instead of waiting for a higher leadership opening that could be years away.
Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean last week said he was foregoing another bid to be Democratic National Committee chairman because he recognized that it’s time for younger politicians to run the party.
“We need somebody from the next generation to be in charge of everything,” he told MSNBC. “Not just on the Democratic side but Republican side to empower this very generation that we’re talking about,” he said, referring to discussions within the House Democratic Caucus.
“I really feel strongly our party needs to turn itself over to the next generation,” he added. “I’m happy to stay in the background and help coach the next chair.”
In her weekly news conference Friday, Pelosi sounded as if she is staying on because she doesn’t see anyone to pass the baton to yet.
“I’m practically liberated by it because more people want to take responsibility and in no way would they consider this lower level, especially from their perspective in the Congress,” she told reporters about the new positions she created. “It’s a big honor. Their invigoration is important to it all and as we go forward as we did in ’05 and ’06.”
She also made clear that she sees many of her critics as upstarts.
“I mean these are substantial places,” she said about the new spots. “It took me 15 years … these people get there in [their] freshman year or a couple of terms.”
Minnesota’s Keith Ellison is promising to rebuild the Democrats’ bench in his bid to become DNC chairman.
“[B]ut the real people [who’ve] got to be put in the game to fight are the people who work on the grassroots every day all across this country,” Ellison told MSNBC last week. “And that means the Democratic Party needs to be moving resources towards the grassroots to empower them. That means communications, technology, but mostly heart and a fighting spirit for working people.”
Maryland’s Elijah Cummings acknowledged that Democrats have almost no bench and said the leadership changes approved by the caucus are meant to help rectify that.
Having more and newer members in leadership posts is “certainly a way to strengthen your bench,” he said. “The key is giving people experience, letting them see how the inner workings of the caucus is done and giving them roles so that the can actually experience making decisions and pulling people together to build consensus.”
Whether Pelosi and other veteran House Democrats go far enough to satisfy the young turks remains to be seen.
“She’s taken some tentative steps but it’s my sense that she’s still got a ways to go,” Manley said. “It is what it is and something’s gotta change over there.”
