Congressional colleagues are reportedly urging House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to run for another term following strong results for Democrats in the midterm elections.
Appearing on CNN’s “State of the Union” and ABC’s “This Week,” Pelosi said that she will make a decision on whether to seek House leadership before Nov. 30.
“People are campaigning and that’s a beautiful thing. And I’m not asking anyone for anything,” she said on Sunday. “My members are asking me to consider doing that. But, again, let’s just get through the (midterm) election.”
“A great deal is at stake, because we will be in a presidential election,” Pelosi added.
This comes after Democrats gained control of the Senate following Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto’s victory in Nevada on Saturday. Should the party win a runoff election in Georgia next month, Democrats may have a larger majority in the next Congress.
Pelosi, however, expressed her disappointment over four Democratic losses in New York, including by Congressional Campaign Chairman Sean Patrick Maloney.
“Nonetheless, we still think we have a chance to win this,” she said. “Nobody would have ever expected that we would be this close. Well, we expected it.”
Politico reported recently that Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, the No. 5 House Democrat, met with House Majority Whip James Clyburn in a “secret meeting” on Sept. 1 to potentially replace Pelosi as the leader of the House Democrats.
In an interview with the news outlet, Clyburn said that he would not block Jeffries from becoming the next leader.
“There’s nothing I would ever do to impede the progress of our up-and-coming young Democrats and I see him as an up-and-coming young Democrat,” he said. “He knows that, I didn’t have to tell him that — but I did.”
On the GOP side, House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy is also seeking to become House Speaker should his party prevail, but the disappointing showing in the midterms has created a rift between leaders.
Former President Donald Trump on Sunday blamed McConnell for the Republican Party’s shortcomings during the midterms.
“It’s Mitch McConnell’s fault. Spending money to defeat great Republican candidates instead of backing Blake Masters and others was a big mistake,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “He blew the Midterms, and everyone despises him and his otherwise lovely wife, Coco Chow!”
