Sources
Gaynor, Garren Keith. Progressives want Ayanna Pressley, not Hakeem Jeffries, as the next House speaker. The Grio. November 12, 2026. https://thegrio.com/2026/11/12/progressives-want-ayanna-pressley-not-hakeem-jeffries-as-next-house-speaker/
Johnson, Jake. As Top Dems Waver, Van Hollen and Khanna Work to Axe Funds for Trump’s Iran War. Common Dreams. November 12, 2026. https://www.commondreams.org/news/van-hollen-khanna-iran-war-funding
Wilkins, Brett. With 74% of Voters Saying Iran War Was Big Factor in Midterms, Dems Urged to Become Peace Party. Common Dreams. November 4, 2026. https://www.commondreams.org/news/dems-urged-to-become-anti-war-party
APPROPRIATIONS VS. RECONCILIATION: WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE FOR HUD HOUSING PROGRAMS? National Low Income Housing Coalition. Accessed November 13, 2026. https://nlihc.org/sites/default/files/Appropriations%20vs%20Reconciliation%20Factsheet_2.pdf
Wilson, Mallory. Trump urges Senate leadership to move $350B reconciliation bill. The Hill. November 12, 2026. https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/6217053-donald-trump-senate-leadership-350b-reconciliation-bill/?tbref=hp
Huiskes, Helen. Senate Democrats weigh December funding deadline to force an end to Iran war. The Hill. November 12, 2026. https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/6217635-senate-democrats-threaten-shutdown-iran/
Cohen, Michael A. Some Democrats are targeting Jeffries and Schumer. That’s a mistake. MS Now. November 10, 2026. https://www.ms.now/opinion/jeffries-schumer-house-senate-democrats-vote
Thorp, Frank. Sen. Chris Van Hollen says he will challenge Sen. Chuck Schumer for majority leader. NBC News. November 13, 2026. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/sen-chris-van-hollen-says-will-challenge-sen-chuck-schumer-majority-le-rcna609100
Transcript
Yesterday, Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen announced he would be running to replace Chuck Schumer as Senate Majority leader when the caucus meets privately to elect their leader for the new term starting in January. This announcement came after sustained grassroots advocacy in favor of replacing both Schumer and Jeffries due to their abysmal leadership through two years of opposition Democrats sitting on their hands while the world watches Donald Trump destroy everything. Even the murder of two civilians in the streets of Minneapolis this winter wasn’t enough to get either leader to do anything with whatever little leverage they did have. And there is a deep divide between the priorities of most of the elected representatives in Congress and what the American people, the people who put them in office to begin with, actually want. Replacing Schumer and Jeffries with people more responsive to the will of the electorate is a necessary first step to opposing the ongoing fascist threat inside the United States. And the grassroots push to replace Schumer and Jeffries, after they so brazenly claimed the blue wave last week as their own victory and assumed without doubt that they would be handed leadership roles on a silver platter, that grassroots push is WORKING. Hundreds of calls have been flooding congressional offices every day, and the push is not over. So yes this is my second video in a week talking about this issue, because it is that important and it is NOT a foregone conclusion like limp dick centrists would have you believe. This is my official treatise on why Chris Van Hollen deserves the majority leader position, and why YOUR work pushing to get Schumer and Jeffries out matters.
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First, quick reminder why this matters: whoever leads the Senate as the majority leader and the house as the speaker sets the legislative agenda, determines who is a member of what committee, and what votes happen and when on the floor of their respective chamber. They have incredible amounts of power in the day to day functioning of Congress to determine what happens, what is given oxygen and what is dead on arrival. They set the policy and determine the outcomes of the Congress. Outside of what happens on the chamber floor, they have incredible amounts of power to determine the messaging of the party, how its communicating with the American people, they have incredible amounts of fundraising power, they help determine and sometimes handpick candidates for future elections, and as we’ll talk about their power can even outlast their speakership as is the case with Nancy Pelosi. These are incredibly consequential positions.
And it matters that we replace Schumer and Jeffries because they have held these consequential positions for years now and have shown time and again to be incapable of meeting the moment, of speaking truth to power in ways that go beyond a “strongly worded letter”, of standing up to a fascist dictatorship at a time when we the American people needed them most. I was among the millions of Minnesotans being terrorized on the streets of Minneapolis this past winter and then I had to watch while Schumer capitulated to the Republicans on a shut down when he had the leverage to force them to negotiate over ICE funding, over healthcare funding, time and again Schumer failed to use what little strategic leverage he had. While people were literally being gunned down in my streets Schumer sat on his hands in Washington, hemming and hawing over whether a government shut down was “worth it.”
Both Schumer and Jeffries have the charisma of a pile of cold wet noodles, they inspire no hope, they inspire no excitement, they inspire no action. Both have accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars from AIPAC and are some of the most Israel-aligned lawmakers in Congress despite the historic unpopularity of the state of Israel and its genocide on the Gazan people. They have proven time and again to put themselves, their political ambitions, and the desires of their biggest donors over their constituents and the American people, and that is entirely to the detriment of the Democratic party which once at least on paper represented workers and marginalized groups and now works to exclusively represent the will of wealthy elites without even pretending to give a shit about union members or teachers or working class folks or minorities. Neither man has presented the American public with any semblance of a cohesive vision for the future, of a plan for what they’ll do for Americans if they are given these positions of power, and that’s largely because they haven’t felt they had to. They both assumed their leadership positions would be handed to them on a silver platter despite extraordinarily low approval ratings and despite being very publicly bad at their jobs for nigh on a decade at this point. It was not until this grassroots movement calling for their ouster that Chuck Schumer even bothered to mention he may or may not have a concrete plan for the first 100 days of the new Democratic-led term. Mind you he hasn’t shared this genius vision with the American public, as far as I know. I learned about it from an article from the hill that had intel about a private Democratic lunch meeting from earlier this week. The plan is basically: undo what Trump did. Restore health insurance premium subsidies, undo cuts to medicaid and hospitals, and reverse Trump’s tariffs. Once again, using Trump as the main foil to any policy agenda whatsoever, the promise is “see, we’re not as bad as him.” That is not a vision. Beyond that, he wants to advance bills that would set up the national debate heading into the 2028 presidential election that address quote “cost, chaos, and corruption.” It’s unclear what that means. Both men are far more comfortable taking personal private meetings with the likes of Donald Trump and Jared Kushner than they are speaking to the American people or understanding even one ounce of what the American people want.
This is evidenced, for example, by Hakeem Jeffries’ voting record, which Rebekah Jones helpfully listed out on twitter the other day. Among many other things, Jeffries has voted to pass bills honoring charlie kirk, providing weapons to israel, making criticism of Israel a hate crime, condemning anti-genocide protests on campuses, declaring that contrary to popular belief and also facts, Israel is not racist and is not apartheid, providing $1 billion dollars for Israel’s Iron Dome, cutting funding for the UNRWA and stating the US would not recognize the international criminal court which is actively trying to hold Netanyahu accountable for war crimes, calling anti-zionism antisemitism, removing tax-exempt status from groups opposing genocide, objecting to the UN resolution criticizing Israeli occupation in Palestine, and denouncing the “horrors” of socialism. THAT is what Hakeem Jeffries has been busy doing–standing in lock-step with the Trump regime on issues relating to Israel, protests on college campuses, and rejection of the horrors of socialism. THAT is what he cares about.
Neither of these men stand for the things that Americans want the Democrats to do with this new majority–advocate for the American people, get out of endless wars, and make life more affordable. It’s not even that these men don’t KNOW what the American people want, it’s that they truly do not care. And it is our job to make them care. And that’s why these votes for leadership in Congress next year are so important–they thought the leadership positions would be handed to them, they need to work for it, they need to be forced to the table, they need to be ripped from their ivory towers and forced to not only acknowledge the mere existence and legitimacy of the growing left flank of the Democratic party but actually engage with their policy proposals and share a seat at the table with them. They will not do that until they are forced to. And I, for one, would love to have people in positions of power in Congress that have earned those positions and that don’t require so much force to get them to even acknowledge the existence of progressives within their own party.
And that’s why I think the growing call for Chris Van Hollen to replace Chuck Schumer is the right move. Van Hollen is the Democratic Senator from Maryland. He is endorsed by Citizens Against AIPAC Corruption. He opposes the war in Iran and is actively pushing for future budget negotiations to hinge on blocking funding for the war. In fact he has a deep and interesting history with foreign policy. Chris Van Hollen was born in Pakistan to American parents on assignment working for the US government. His dad was a foreign service officer and his mom worked for the CIA and the State Department. Throughout his childhood he lived in Pakistan, Turkey, India, and Sri Lanka. Look at that, someone who’s left the east coast of the United States before and it wasn’t just to visit Israel, can’t say the same for Jeffries or Schumer. He has a masters of public policy from Harvard and a law degree from Georgetown. Unlike Chuck Schumer, Van Hollen has had jobs other than politician. Prior to entering politics he worked as a legislative assistant, on the US senate committee on foreign relations, as a legislative advisor for the governor of Maryland, and at the private law firm Arent Fox. Like Schumer, he has a long history in politics, however. He is 67, only a few years younger than 75 year old Schumer. He entered the Maryland state legislature from 1991-2003 and then was elected to the US house. In 2006 he pissed off the Israel lobby by voting in favor of a ceasefire in the Lebanon war going on at the time. And he proved politicians are, in fact, capable of standing up to the Israel lobby. They don’t spontaneously combust or melt into a puddle on the floor it is actually possible to oppose the Israel lobby and EVEN, if you can believe, continue to win elections. Which Chris Van Hollen has done handily. He joined the Senate in 2016 after a successful time serving in the House and has kept that seat ever since. Throughout his time in office he has championed environmental protections, common sense gun reform, funding for education and healthcare. He has declared his support for medicare for all. He has introduced campaign finance laws to curb spending in our elections. He worked on both the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, something that should appease the people who claim to support Schumer mainly because he can “win elections.” Van Hollen can too, without also being completely beholden to a foreign power influencing US politics. He has called out Israel for ethnic cleansing in Palestine and he has voted to block the sale of weapons to Israel. He supported early on the use of the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office. And at the beginning of Trump’s second term, when his constituent from Maryland Kilmar Abrego Garcia was forcibly kidnapped and trafficked by the US government to CECOT, a maximum security prison in El Salvador, Van Hollen personally flew to El Salvador and pressured the leaders of that country until they finally allowed him to meet with Abrego Garcia and check on his wellbeing. Of the couple of strengths Schumer’s supporters claim he has, namely an ability to win elections, and even that is questionable at best, Chris Van Hollen can do it just as well, while also using the leverage he has to make change happen and championing policies that are popular to the American people and would actually tangibly improve lives in the US. He is easily the best man for the job between the two of them, far and above Schumer’s abysmal performance over the last decade, it’s time for Schumer to step down or be forced out of power to make room for someone who will actually represent the will of the American people, not the will of Israel and a few of the richest people in the room.
If you have not called your democratic senators yet, there is still time. They will be meeting in a couple weeks in December to make their choice for Senate majority leader in a closed door secret ballot vote. We have to keep up the pressure because it’s fucking working.
Now let’s talk about Hakeem Jeffries because that’s a different ballgame. Van Hollen needs the support of probably 28 senators to unseat Schumer. He already has over 10, it’s on us to keep calling our Democratic senators non stop, especially the ones who haven’t pledged to get rid of Schumer. In the house, there is no clear person who would challenge Hakeem Jeffries. The selection of who to put forth as the speaker is done behind closed doors, likely next week. They do publicly vote on the floor of the House at the beginning of session, but that’s mainly procedural, they select the person they know has enough votes long before that first session of Congress. The vote for speaker just requires a bare majority, which is the same in the Senate but there are HUNDREDS of Democratic representatives to wrangle. And this is where Nancy Pelosi comes into play. She was the speaker of the house before Hakeem Jeffries. She hand selected Jeffries to be her successor and she had a hand in a LOT of the current Democratic representatives elections, campaigns, and re-elections over the years, especially the more centrist establishment Democrats. This means that a lot of them feel beholden to Jeffries as Pelosi’s successor, to keep the powers that be happy so they can keep their seats. There is also the argument that especially members of the black caucus in the house are interested in representation via the first black speakership as much as if not more than what the American people actually want.
So the reality is that the American people see the job of Representatives and Senators VERY differently than our Representatives and Senators see their job. We look at them and we think ok you’re elected, now represent us. Do what’s in our best interests. Pass substantive laws that improve our lives that do the things you promised that we put you in place to do in the first place. Makes sense from the outside. But the reality is that so many of our electeds have their heads in a game of inside baseball. They’re not thinking “how do I best serve my constituents today” they’re thinking “how do I keep my seat in the next election.” And because our elections are dominated by monied interests who own the people at the highest ranks of the DNC, what we the people want and what our electeds need to do to get the corporate PAC money for their next election are often two very different things, and the corporate PAC money will win 100% of the time until we get money out of politics. And Chris Van Hollen has worked to reform our campaign finance system while Schumer and Jeffries just ride the AIPAC wave.
But there has to be some sort of consensus around WHO should replace Jeffries, like there has been around Van Hollen replacing Schumer, otherwise it’s just a fractured dissent with no direction. But there has been some consensus growing around Ayanna Pressley as a potential replacement. She has not indicated any intention of running against him, but here’s why she would be a great pick. I happily voted for Pressley when she first ran for Congress in 2018 when I was living in Boston for law school. She has represented Massachusett’s 7th district since then. She is an incredibly strong orator and debater and speaks in a way that instills excitement and hope in people, something Jeffries is woefully pitiful at. And her strength and success is all the more impressive given what she’s had to overcome. Her father struggled with addiction and her mother worked and raised her as a single mom in a rough Chicago neighborhood. She is a survivor of child sexual abuse and college sexual assault. She attended Boston University but dropped out in order to work to provide for her family when her mother lost her job. She also struggles with alopecia. Despite all that, she excelled at school, did competitive debate in high school where she was voted most likely to be mayor of Chicago and was her class commencement speaker. After attending college she worked as the constituency director for Representative Joseph Kennedy, then as the political director and senior aide for Senator John Kerry. And in 2009 she was elected to Boston City Council, becoming the first black woman to serve in that role. She worked for Boston to address domestic violence, child abuse, equality in healthcare regardless of gender identity, and she championed woman and minority owned businesses in Boston. Her congressional district is not majority white and she was the first black woman ever to be sent to Congress from Massachusetts. In Congress she has introduced a resolution to call for Brett Kavanaugh’s impeachment, pushed for criminal justice reform that includes decriminalizing sex work, abolishing cash bail, legalizing marijuana, abolishing capital punishment and solitary confinement, and shrinking the US prison population. She slept on the steps of the US capitol building with Cori Bush and Ilhan Omar to protest the expiration of the COVID eviction moratorium in 2021. She is a strong advocate for medicare for all and a federal protection for abortions. She’s been calling for the defunding of ICE since at least 2018 and she’s an advocate for free public transit. She has also accepted zero dollars from AIPAC or the Israel lobby.
Some are speculating that she’s putting out feelers for a potential challenge to Hakeem Jeffries because she just launched an official agenda, asking for signatures to endorse her agenda, which offers a straightforward list, something Jeffries and Schumer are incapable of producing. It says, suggestively, “If it were up to Ayanna Pressley, we’d use our Democratic majority to fight for: Saving health care. Not just reversing Republicans’ cuts–advancing Medicare for ALL. Passing national abortion protections. Not just restoring what was stripped away–expanding reproductive rights. Stopping data centers. Putting real guardrails and oversight in place over the AI industry. And Abolishing ICE. Period. These are really clear cut policy goals that a lot of Americans would get behind and is a far clearer agenda than anything we’re seeing from Jeffries or Schumer.
Okay, so what happens next. This is important. Next week, the house will meet to pick their speaker. A petition to elect Ayanna Pressley as speaker of the house has gained 90,000 signatures and counting, and you can sign that but the best thing you can do is CALL your representatives and tell them to get rid of Jeffries and back Pressley. I think offering them a person to get behind is really important beyond just asking them to oust Jeffries. Pressley like I said hasn’t said she’s throwing her hat in the race but she’s made insinuations, I don’t know I’ve been all over her social media goading her to run for it and her social media has been a lot of talk about how Democrats in the house need bold leadership and to do away with incrementalism so I don’t know sounds like a sales pitch to me and I am sold. So I think much like with Chris Van Hollen, with enough outpouring of support we can push her to seriously consider it. Anything Jeffries can do, she can do better while also having an ethical backbone and a vision for the future, and the black caucus would still get representation as she would be the first black speaker of the house, a title she is far more deserving of than Jeffries. So call your democratic reps and recommend Ayanna Pressley instead.
In the Senate, continue pressuring your Democratic senators to vote for Van Hollen, but also keep your eye on the budget issues coming up, I think things will get very interesting. So government funding runs out on December 11th, in under a month. Republicans will still have full control of the house and senate, the new blue wave doesn’t hit Congress til January. It is likely that Congress will attempt to introduce a continuing resolution or CR to keep the government open until the new Democratic majority takes over and passes a full budget then. HOWEVER, Republicans will almost certainly include funding for the war with Iran as part of this continuing resolution, which offers democrats some leverage. The house just needs a majority to pass a CR, which Republicans currently have, but in the Senate because of the filibuster they need 60 senators to approve a CR, which Republicans don’t have, so Democrats can hold out on voting to approve a budget until funding for the Iran war has been removed from the budget. This would be incredibly popular with the American people who just voted in a Democratic majority. An NBC exit poll found that 74% of voters cited the Iran War as a crucial or major factor in their vote. People do not like this war it is incredibly expensive not only because it’s using BILLIONS of taxpayer dollars but also because it is inflating the price of oil, causing gas and diesel prices to soar which Americans feel every single day at the pump and also translates to increased prices everywhere because of increased shipping costs. That is a really clear, easy cause and effect to relay to the American public. Your bills are higher because of Trump’s stupid war with Iran. So Democrats have an opportunity in mere weeks to stand ten toes down on a policy that would be incredibly popular with their base and say no we want to fund the government but we cannot use any more taxpayer dollars to fund this war. And then Republicans can choose to shoot down proposals that don’t include funding for the war. And if there’s a government shutdown it would, once again, be a very easy sell to the American people. The Republicans have chosen to shut down the government in order to push funding for this war no one wants. It’s an easy win. With Schumer in charge, based on his track record, he’s going to fuck it up. He has capitulated at every other budget impasse and has failed to use the little leverage he has to help the American people. Chris Van Hollen has already promised he will not vote to fund the Iran war. Schumer may pay lip service to it but at the end of the day he’s going to fold like a house of cards, which will be even more proof of the need to replace him. Because he is more beholden to the Israeli government than to the American people, and they want this war. So keep an eye out for that continuing resolution next month as well as the reconciliation bill Trump is pushing for that would give the Pentagon 350 BILLION taxpayer dollars to increase funding for the war. That bill only needs a bare majority but even some Republicans are pissed about the war, too, and know that their constituents wouldn’t take kindly to a green light on that much war spending.
These budget stalemates go both ways, however. Because the Democrats didn’t win a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, they’ll struggle to get budget bills passed without pushback from Republicans. And you better bet your ass that Republicans aren’t going to buckle under the pressure like Schumer did. He has proven himself incapable of standing up in opposition to Trump and MAGA and the growing fascism in the United States. It’s time to replace him. I think Van Hollen is the best guy for the job. So call your Democratic Senators and tell them that, too.
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If you liked this video, you’ll like my video from yesterday about why we might finally be able to get rid of the electoral college.
