House Democrats have scheduled their leadership elections even as they await election results from across the country that will determine which party attains control of the House.
As of Thursday evening, Decision Desk HQ gave Republicans an 85.1% chance of keeping the House. Several seats are still too close to call.
House Democratic Caucus Chairman Pete Aguilar (D-CA) announced they will hold leadership elections on Nov. 19 and Nov. 20. He said in a letter that “while control of the House has not yet been decided … We must prepare to continue our work to put People Over Politics in the 119th Congress while the process of counting every vote continues.”
Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) is expected to remain as House Democratic leader even if they stay in the minority. Democrats would likely lament the missed chance to make Jeffries speaker of the House, a goal they had reiterated multiple times during the 2024 campaign.
House Minority Whip Katherine Clark (D-MA) and Aguilar are expected to keep their positions.
While House Democrats have flipped several seats away from Republicans, including three in Jeffries’s home state of New York, they face an uphill battle to grab the majority. They’d need to capture 19 of the remaining 25 seats that haven’t been called by the Associated Press. Republicans only need seven for a majority.
Jeffries released a statement on Thursday suggesting that Democrats are still awaiting election results to determine their next moves.
“It has yet to be decided who will control the House of Representatives in the 119th Congress,” he said. “We must count every vote and wait until the results in Oregon, Arizona and California are clear.”
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House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA) are running again for their respective positions in the Republican Party.
Democrats are facing down a Republican trifecta in the White House, Senate, and House. They likely won’t give up on the latter until the last votes are counted.