As planned, Hakeem Jeffries was elected this Wednesday as the new leader of the Democrats in the United States House of Representatives, thus taking over the baton left behind by Nancy Pelosi and becoming the first black person to assume the leadership of one of the two parties in Congress.
Jeffries, a 53-year-old New York representative, has been unopposed. His election represents an important generational change within the party, since the three former leaders, Pelosi, Steny Hoyer and Jim Clyburn, who will run for “assistant leader”, the fourth in the ranking, are in their 80s.
This generational change in the party’s leadership within the House is completed by Katherine Clark, 59, a representative from Massachusetts to be in charge of party discipline, and the representative from California Pete Aguilar, 43, to chair the Democratic caucus.
The vote to occupy the ‘number four’ of the party within the Chamber will take place this Thursday. In addition to the Clyburn veteran, David Cicilline, 61, is running for office, who has appealed to his status as a member of the LGBTQ community to assert his candidacy.
“I believe it is critical that the House Democratic Leadership team fully reflect the diversity of our caucus and the American people by including an LGBTQ member at the leadership table, which is why I have decided to run for assistant leader.” , has explained.
After the midterm elections in early November, the Republicans managed to take control of the House of Representatives, although not as they had hoped, so for the next two years the triumvirate led by Jeffries will lead a exiguous a Democratic minority.
Jeffries’s rise has been meteoric, since in 2019 he became the youngest Democrat to chair his party’s caucus, a body that is responsible for electing its leaders within each of the houses of Congress, establishing discipline and the rules of the formation and approve the committees and their assignments.
The one who will be her predecessor, Pelosi, who on Tuesday was named by her “speaker emeritus” for her almost two decades at the head of the Democrats in the House, has given her blessing to the trio headed by Jeffries, whom she trusts to lead with ability the designs of the party.
