House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries backed Chuck Schumer, his Senate counterpart, amid a progressive backlash to Schumer’s handling of a compromise to end the government shutdown.
“Yes and yes,” Jeffries told reporters Monday when asked if Schumer was effective as Senate minority leader and should keep his job. Jeffries and other Democratic leaders have signaled they will oppose the stopgap funding bill when it comes to the House later this week. Schumer voted against advancing the legislation Sunday.
Jeffries added that “the overwhelming majority of Senate Democrats, led by Chuck Schumer, have weighed a valiant fight over the last seven weeks, defeating the partisan Republican spending bill 14 or 15 different times, week after week after week.”
It’s a departure from how Jeffries responded to questions about Schumer’s leadership in March. Jeffries broke from his Senate counterpart then after Schumer and nine other Senate Democrats voted to advance a GOP-backed stopgap funding bill. Jeffries ignited an internal firestorm at the time when he passed up a chance to vouch for Schumer’s leadership.
“Next question,” he said when asked if there should be new Democratic leadership in the Senate. House Democrats fumed about Schumer’s leadership in the aftermath of the Senate vote, with some calling for him to step down or face a primary challenge.
The two Democratic leaders took pains to stay publicly unified as they navigated the runup to the shutdown, aligning on a strategy to elevate health care as a central issue.
But they carved out subtle tactical differences as the shutdown wore on. Jeffries insisted any health care agreement needed to be “ironclad and in legislation” rather than a handshake commitment, while Schumer did not draw a similar red line.
While Schumer is opposing the GOP-led stopgap this time around, many House Democrats are furious that he did not block the eight members of his caucus from cutting a deal with Republicans.
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