Congress

Hakeem Jeffries’ redistricting crusade runs into resistance from fellow Democrats

Published

10 months ago

September 12, 2025

Hakeem Jeffries is presenting himself as a hard-charging leader of his party, pushing a crash blue-state redistricting program to counter President Donald Trump’s moves to add Republican seats in Texas, Missouri and elsewhere.

But behind the scenes, the House minority leader is encountering the limits of his power — and the credibility of Democrats’ counterattack. Just this week, some Illinois lawmakers sent Jeffries a clear message they were not interested in pursuing a redraw that could dilute their districts with additional GOP votes. And in his home state of New York, state and party officials have all but rejected his suggestion they draw a new map, saying it’s not legally possible ahead of the midterms.

Jeffries privately met with members of the Illinois delegation on Tuesday to hear out their redistricting concerns, according to five people granted anonymity to share details of the discussion. Jeffries told them to keep all of their options open but acknowledged every Democratic member of the congressional delegation would need to buy in to a redraw before it could move forward, the people said.

After a post-2020 Census revision, only three of the state’s 17 congressional districts are represented by Republicans. But up to four Democratic incumbents could face tougher races if those GOP-held seats were made bluer, said Rep. Robin Kelly, a former chair of the Democratic Party of Illinois.

“We have to look out and protect who we have because we fought hard to get them in,” Kelly said in an interview. “I’m not a mapmaker, but it seems like it will be very difficult.”

“Everyone is talking about it,” she added, when asked if she had registered her concerns to Jeffries or Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker.

Some in the party believe that because four incumbent Illinois Democrats are exiting, including Kelly, there might be some wiggle room to redraw lines without undue disruption. But Rep. Lauren Underwood, who is seeking reelection in one of those potentially marginal districts, was blunt: “I don’t think redistricting is happening in Illinois,” she said. “Talking about it and it happening are two different things. We get on the ballot in six weeks.”

The internal pushback is the latest complication Jeffries faces in delivering the Democratic base a fight against Trump’s majority-protection play — and delivering himself the House gavel in the midterms.

Jeffries has worked to put himself at the forefront of the nationwide map fight, though his work has primarily played out behind the scenes through meetings with his members and calls to blue-state governors. He has publicly championed state Democrats’ resistance to the GOP redraw in Texas and privately discussed potential counterattacks with Pritzker and Maryland Gov. Wes Moore. He has tapped his donor network to help bankroll Gov. Gavin Newsom’s ballot measure that would enable a new map in California, where Democrats hope to add five more seats to offset potential GOP gains in Texas.

“Republicans were apparently operating under the misguided notion that we were going to let them get away with trying to rig the midterm elections without a forceful response. They were badly mistaken,” Jeffries told reporters last week. “At the end of the day, it’s not going to work out well for them.”

John Bisognano, president of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, said Jeffries has been a “true leader” amid a “very dramatic process.”

“I think it’s been really difficult and a yeoman’s task to try and get members all on the same page when many of them have their own vested interests, but also many of them just genuinely need a deeper understanding of a very complicated topic,” he said.

But Jeffries is not Trump, a dominant leader who can snap his fingers and grind his intraparty critics into submission. The White House has mounted a maximalist pressure campaign, hauling reticent state Republicans to Washington and dispatching top aides and even Vice President JD Vance to strong-arm GOP governors and lawmakers.

Jeffries is in a much more precarious position. Just two-and-a-half years into his party’s top House leadership job, he still has to be mindful of the wishes of the lawmakers who elected him, even as a restless Democratic base pushes party leaders to fight Trump and Republicans on all fronts.

He has also been limited by legal guardrails Democrats put up in some blue states to restrict gerrymandering — laws that have now left the party at a disadvantage in what’s becoming a tit-for-tat war. Republican-controlled states will likely be able to draw more Democrats out of their seats than Democrats will be able to target GOP lawmakers in blue states.

That poses a threat to Jeffries’ aspirations of becoming speaker in 2027. Yet the New Yorker has stuck to his low-key, conciliatory leadership style, with Democrats pointing to the deference he’s given to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, state congressional delegations and state-level officials in handling the process.

State legislative leaders in Illinois have been hesitant to embrace redistricting even as Pritzker told reporters he’s “pledged” to Jeffries “that I’ll do everything I can to make sure that Democrats win the Congress in 2026.” As of Thursday, Jeffries had not contacted the Illinois House or Senate leaders about proceeding. In Maryland, top Democrats have yet to make any significant moves. And not all in the party are comfortable with a scorched-earth redistricting strategy.

“They’re going low,” said Rep. Jonathan Jackson (D-Ill.) of Republicans. “We’ve got to fight — I agree with that — but it’s wrong. So two wrongs don’t make it right.” Jackson added he would support Democratic leaders’ ultimate decision on redistricting in Illinois.

In New York, Jeffries’ team failed to get immediate action from Democratic state lawmakers and Gov. Kathy Hochul to redraw House lines in time for next year’s elections. Jeffries and the governor were in contact, and Hochul in August embraced gerrymandering in response to Texas’ actions. But a quasi-independent commission and a prohibition against partisan redistricting has been enshrined by voters in the New York constitution. Any changes would require an amendment, which takes at least two years to finalize.

The efforts by Jeffries and his advisers frustrated New York Democrats, who had scant options to quickly redraw the state’s House map. It didn’t help matters that the Brooklyn Democrat’s team provided little guidance.

“Jeffries’ people were the main people pushing for it,” said a Democratic state legislative aide close to the process who was granted anonymity to speak frankly about internal discussions. “They were pushing Hochul with no real clear understanding of what to do.”

Jeffries’ push comes as he navigates far broader political headwinds. He’s being pummeled by progressives at home for not backing democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani in the New York City mayoral race, while facing pressure on Blue Light News to show whatever backbone the minority party can muster in the next big fight over government funding.

“He’s really kind of straddled both worlds here: He clearly, fully embraced this redistricting fight, while also being one of the holdouts in endorsing the Democratic nominee for mayor of the biggest city in his state,” said Andrew O’Neill, national advocacy director at the progressive group Indivisible, which has backed Mamdani for mayor. “Straddling that line is not a permanently tenable position to be in. At some point you’re going to have to pick what side you’re on — and that time might be coming about rapidly.”

Inside the House Democratic Caucus, Jeffries has gotten plaudits from imperiled Democrats for his handling of the GOP redistricting threats to their own seats, which included meetings with the Texas delegation and issuing repeated public threats of blue-state retaliation.

“He’s been as helpful in the Texas fight as possible,” said Rep. Julie Johnson, whose Dallas-area seat is one of the five in the state targeted for a GOP takeover.

New York Democratic Chair Jay Jacobs, a Jeffries ally, said the House leader shouldn’t be judged harshly for his inability to secure rapid map changes across the country — even in his own backyard.

“In his position, you don’t hold all the levers of power across the various states,” Jacobs said. “You can only advocate and state your case. I think he did it well. What individual states can do is outside his control.”

Shia Kapos contributed to this report.

Congress

Congressional Black Caucus blasts Slotkin over her calls for new leadership in the House

Published

13 hours ago

June 27, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

The Congressional Black Caucus is emphatically declaring its support for House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries — and denouncing Sen. Elissa Slotkin’s call for new leadership in Congress.

In a statement posted to social media on Friday, the entirely Democratic CBC declared that it stands united behind the nation’s first Black minority leader of the House. The caucus accused the Michigan senator of “posturing for higher office in 2028” and called attention to her votes to approve multiple members of President Donald Trump’s Cabinet.

“House Democrats don’t need a lesson on reading the political moment from someone who handed Donald Trump one of the most corrupt Cabinets in American history,” the CBC said. “Voting to confirm Kristi Noem, Pam Bondi, and five other Trump Cabinet secretaries is not the posture of someone who understood the moment’ after 2024.”

The CBC closed its defense of Jeffries with a sharp parting shot of remaining focused on providing for Americans rather than “engaging in distractions that only serve to divide Democrats at a moment when unity and resolve are essential.”

A spokesperson for Slotkin, who has repeatedly called for a new generation of leadership in Congress, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Congress

Key Democrats urge House to reject kids’ safety proposal

Published

16 hours ago

June 26, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

The Commerce Committee’s top Democrat Maria Cantwell (Wash.) and Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) warned House lawmakers against advancing their chamber’s version of the Kids Online Safety Act, arguing it would face intense lobbying from tech companies in the Senate and risk unraveling years of bipartisan work.

“If it is passed by the House it will come to the Senate,” Blumenthal, the bill’s Senate cosponsor, told reporters at a Friday press briefing. The Connecticut Democrat said he is concerned senators will be influenced by the tech industry’s “armies of lawyers and lobbyists” who may “confuse and exploit” misunderstandings about a House bill with the same name as a Senate version but excludes key provisions, such as the “duty of care.” (This concept requires online companies to design social media platforms with an eye for children’s safety.)

“We’re not going to let bad legislation with a good title just get across and think somebody’s done something,” Cantwell said.

The House version of KOSA — which is included in the KIDS Act, a revised bipartisan package that the Energy and Commerce Committee advanced along party lines in March — is scheduled to be considered on the House floor next week under suspension of the rules.

“We need to stop this bill in the House, and we need to prevent the White House from forming an alliance with Big Tech on this issue,” said Blumenthal, who characterized the version of KOSA that House leadership is pushing as a “sham.”

Both Democratic lawmakers also expressed concern that Senate Commerce Committee Chair Ted Cruz (R-Texas) could adopt the House version of KOSA in a kids’ safety package he has yet to publicly release but has pledged to markup by August recess. Cruz said “negotiations are ongoing” earlier this week when asked by Blue Light News whether he would be open to incorporating such changes put forward in the House.

Cruz’s package is expected to include KOSA as well legislation barring companies from using minors’ personal data for targeted advertising, banning kids under age 13 from social media, and providing greater oversight for how children interact with AI chatbots.

Although Blumenthal remains hopeful that Cruz will “stay true to his first vote in favor of KOSA,” which overwhelmingly passed in the Senate last Congress, the Connecticut Democrat said Friday he’s worried Cruz and others may be tempted to “take the bait” and abandon the bill’s basic principles.

Congress

Moderates beware: Mamdani coalition portends a dramatically different Democratic Party in NYC

Published

20 hours ago

June 26, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

NEW YORK — A coalition powered by Mayor Zohran Mamdani expanded the left’s reach Tuesday, winning younger voters across racial and ethnic lines and once again upending conventional wisdom about elections in New York City.

A series of hotly contested congressional and state elections pit a slate of Mamdani-backed democratic socialists and progressives against establishment candidates who, in several cases, differed little on policy aside from U.S.-Israel relations.

The results were staggering.

Midterm election cycles in deep-blue New York City tend to be sleepy affairs. Both this year and in 2022, just over 500,000 people cast ballots, less than 20 percent of eligible voters. But turnout within a congressional district spanning Upper Manhattan and the Bronx increased by roughly 50 percent between 2022 and Tuesday, with more than 66,000 voters heading to the polls.

In another seat covering parts of Brooklyn and Queens, turnout more than doubled from 2022, though state and federal elections were held on different days that year and the seat was not competitive, which would have reduced the number of voters going to the polls.

Congressional candidates backed by the Democratic Socialists of America were able to replicate the mayor’s success by winning younger Latino voters in Brooklyn and a majority of Black voters in Harlem. Combined with the DSA’s base in relatively wealthy neighborhoods, the result charted the far left’s broadening appeal and a potential reorientation of the electorate that will influence races for years to come.

“This was a big wave for DSA and they did a good job capitalizing on it,” said Evan Roth Smith, a pollster with Slingshot Strategies. “The question now is: Was this a wave cycle that will abate, or is it the start of the takeover?”

Much of Mamdani’s base is concentrated in the so-called “commie-corridor,” a series of neighborhoods along the Brooklyn-Queens waterfront filled with young, educated and affluent voters who’ve propelled several DSA candidates into office. They went gaga over Mamdani’s candidacy and, as Tuesday’s results show, will turn out for candidates he supports.

The area was crucial to Assemblymember Claire Valdez’s crushing 56-38 defeat of Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso.

“The factor that felt most significant to me were all of these New Yorkers who got activated and politicized in the mayor’s race last year who were looking for the next fight,” said Andrew Epstein, a political adviser to Mamdani who worked on Valdez’ campaign. “Those people didn’t go away. And they want to keep going.”

Valdez also won several heavily Latino areas that were expected to break for her opponent.

Reynoso was born in Brooklyn to Dominican parents and just a few years ago was a City Council member representing Bushwick, a long-gentrifying Brooklyn neighborhood that’s home to Latino families and young hipsters. Valdez was born in Texas, moved to New York City in 2015 and served in the state Assembly for just one term before launching her Mamdani-backed bid for retiring Rep. Nydia Velázquez’s seat.

She ended up winning areas of Bushwick by even greater margins than the total results — in some election districts winning upwards of 80 percent of the vote.

“You don’t win the district by 35 points if you don’t have broad advantages across age and demographic groups,” said Michael Lange, an election analyst and Mamdani supporter who has tracked several contested races with extreme granularity. “Is she blowing him out of the water with Hispanic voters under 50? I see tons of evidence that the answer is yes.”

The age advantage was the common thread across several other races.

In Upper Manhattan and the Bronx, for example, younger Black voters in Harlem were key to Darializa Avila Chevalier’s win over Rep. Adriano Espaillat, the chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus who had built a small political empire in the district.

While gentrifying, the neighborhood remains a seat of Black political power and is home to younger households who tend to rent. That particular demographic is a strong indicator of why Mamdani won the area in 2025, even as he lost the Black vote overall to former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, whose support was concentrated among older Black homeowners in Brooklyn and Queens.

While Espaillat never healed a rift with the Black community in upper Manhattan opened during his election in 2016, which contributed to his weak performance, Avila Chevalier demonstrated Tuesday that a significant share of voters there were not just supportive of Mamdani the person, but of the broader political movement he’s now leading.

Overall, she edged out Espaillat with Black voters 48-46, according to an analysis from The New York Times, which charted demographic breakdowns for several contested races.

Three winning congressional candidates endorsed by Mamdani — including former city Comptroller Brad Lander in Brooklyn, who unseated incumbent Dan Goldman — share several similarities. They won younger, college-educated and wealthier voters by huge margins, in several cases by 30 points or more, and lost lower-income voters to incumbents or candidates affiliated with incumbents — a sign that the movement seeking to boost struggling New Yorkers has not won them over.

While the DSA was able to win three state races without the support of Mamdani — a testament to the organizing prowess of the left that was essential to reactivating the mayor’s coalition — there were limits to the city’s leftward shift.

Rep. Grace Meng won her reelection race, though she only vanquished challenger Chuck Park by 14 points, an uncomfortable margin for an incumbent of her stature. Park, who ran to Meng’s left, was boosted by a huge turnout in Woodside, Queens, a multiethnic neighborhood that went heavily for Mamdani in last year’s mayoral race.

Elsewhere in the Bronx, however, incumbents remained strong. Rep. Ritchie Torres handily won reelection with 72 percent of the vote, though it was a low-turnout affair more consistent with an uncompetitive midterm. Nevertheless, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries touted the results — even as he watched a series of his endorsed candidates fall to the DSA in Brooklyn, his home borough, in a preview of the intraparty battles to come.

“In some higher-income districts, there was an outsized focus on the Middle East. In other districts, for instance, in the South Bronx, Ritchie Torres ran against somebody who was heavily critical of his position on Israel, and he won by fifty points,” Jeffries told MS NOW on Wednesday.