Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer is facing a potentially serious challenge to his hold on power as momentum builds behind Chris Van Hollen, with the Maryland senator now reportedly open to a run for majority leader.

A movement to draft Van Hollen to challenge Schumer is gaining steam, according to Politico Playbook, which reported Monday that two people close to the effort said it was underway.

A person familiar with Van Hollen’s thinking told the outlet that the senator has “received an outpouring of calls and is now in active listening mode.”

  • cattywampas@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    The first and biggest hurdle is that you need people who are not only able but willing to do the job. Not many people want it.

    • Burn_The_Right@lemmy.today
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      18 hours ago

      That and the very serious consequences of challenging and failing. Schumer is a neoliberal conservative. They are as petty and vindictive as any other conservative. Failing can mean no committee positions or draft cosigners until they are gone.

      Conservatives like Schumer are pure evil, even when they have a D next to their name. The risk sounds pretty intimidating. You have to know you have the votes before committing.

    • voidsignal@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      That, to me, is the bar. If someone wants to lead, wants power, wants to be famous etc, they are unqualified. Because it means they really did not understand the job.

      • danc4498@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        Google says there’s only ever been 1 president who was speaker and 1 who was senate majority leader. Accepting these roles seems like a career death sentence.

        • captainlezbian@lemmy.world
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          13 hours ago

          Wait, if there’s only one president who was speaker that has to have been Gerald Ford, who was never elected to executive office, he just replaced vice president Agnew then president Nixon after each stepped down Nevermind, Ford was house minority leader.

          Looks like the speaker was James K. Polk, and the majority leader was Lyndon B. Johnson. Johnson makes sense as he was brought in for vice president to get the south on board with Kennedy.

          • captainlezbian@lemmy.world
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            13 hours ago

            Unless you’re the sort of person who isn’t satisfied with being senate majority leader and swinging “Jumbo” around

    • bedwyr@piefed.ca
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      1 day ago

      Our politicians are chosen to be weak, the corporos fear the left, somehow not so much the right, despite history, preferring the total ruin of dictatorship and ultimate military rule to moderate reform. Such as it’s always been. From the late roman republic, to germany with the nazis, to now.

      Plenty of people want the job, of senator, but any white populist is simply not welcome and will be character assassinated if not killed in the cradle, because they can challenge the leadership, where the inner city minority populists cannot.

      That’s the fucking truth.

      • prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        1 day ago

        but any white populist is simply not welcome and will be character assassinated if not killed in the cradle, because they can challenge the leadership, where the inner city minority populists cannot.

        Nice barely veiled racism

        • bedwyr@piefed.ca
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          1 day ago

          That is too stupid to refute, unless you describe how that is racist, and whom it is racist against, white people? Praytell!