House Democrats, grappling with losses, postpone leadership elections
House Democrats on Tuesday delayed their leadership elections that were slated for Thursday as lawmakers grapple with their election losses and as speculation grows about a bid to challenge their long-time leader Nancy Pelosi.
During a closed-door caucus meeting, Pelosi, the House minority leader, announced that her caucus would forgo a vote on Thursday.
Leadership elections have instead been rescheduled for after Thanksgiving on Nov. 30, according to an aide in the room, who said that was the original date Pelosi had proposed.
Members coming out of the meeting said there was consensus in the room that they needed more time to reflect on the election outcome last week.
“From my standpoint, I don’t care when the election is. I do care that we have the strongest possible leadership at the table, whoever that may be. But again, we’ve been through hell, and it’s only going to get worse as [Donald Trump] makes his appointments and we have this fight. But we have to see it as an opportunity,” Pelosi told her Democratic colleagues, according to the aide.
“The American people expect us to be united,” said House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer, D-Maryland, the aide said.
The announcement from Pelosi to delay the elections comes after a group of Democrats circulated a letter requesting that they be postponed.
“It is vital that our Caucus take the time to listen to the American people and learn the lessons of this difficult election in order to put our Caucus in the best position to fight the potentially dangerous agenda of President-elect Donald Trump and to have a realistic chance of taking back the House in 2018,” said the letter obtained by CBS News.
Reps. Seth Moulton of Massachusetts, Kathleen Rice of New York and Ruben Gallego of Arizona are among the Democrats who signed onto the letter.
“We ask that you postpone leadership elections at least until after the Thanksgiving recess. We feel very strongly that our Members deserve the opportunity to thoroughly discuss the results of the election and analyze how our Party and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s strategy fell so short of our goals,” the letter said.
Rep. Tim Ryan oh Ohio, who has served in Congress since 2003, is reportedly considering mounting a challenge against Pelosi, who has served as House Democratic leader since her party won back control of the House in 2007.
As House Democrats scramble to regroup, there is also a race for the next leader of the Democratic National Committee. Progressives are lobbying for Rep. Keith Ellison of Minnesota who was elected as the first Muslim member of Congress and who announced his bid for DNC chairman on Monday. Other people who have expressed interest are former DNC chairman Howard Dean and former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley said he was looking at it closely.
CBS News’ Walt Cronkite contributed to this report.