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The Senate was a pretty lonely place for some Democrats last week. Certainly, the eight lawmakers who compromised with Senate Republicans to reopen the government after six weeks of a shutdown felt the icy reception.
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But one person—to be clear, someone who voted against the negotiated climb-down—felt the freezer burn more than most: their Minority Leader, Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York. In fact, a poll surveying both the activists who power the Democratic Party and the donors who keep the consultants in line might find no one less popular last week than the steely Schumer—who has come to personify Democrats’ discontent.
Rep. Ro Khanna of California, a good weathervane for his fellow progressives, called on Schumer to “be replaced.” “If you can’t lead the fight to stop healthcare premiums from skyrocketing for Americans, what will you fight for?” Khanna asked on social media.
For his part, Schumer has professed indifference to the discontent and he had pretty good reasoning: no one who wants him gone has the power to make it happen, and no one who could do it is publicly calling for him to go. Even privately, there is little sign that Senate Democrats expect to replace Schumer before the midterm elections, according to just about every Capitol insider with a grudge and an insight. It’s pretty easy to hold onto a job when no one else is ready to step into it.
Thus is the life of a Minority Leader: all stumbles and fumbles and bumbles are of his making, all victories the work of others. The job is thankless even under the best conditions, and these are far from those. And it’s why those who are positioning themselves to potentially follow in Schumer’s shoes aren’t pressing for the position at this very moment when he seems so vulnerable. Much like House Republicans struggled in the recent past to nominate a Speaker not named Kevin McCarthy, being frustrated with the top dog is not sufficient for putting him down until there’s a new Alpha.
But the 74-year-old Schumer won’t be leading his party in the Senate forever. As he weighs his next move, many in Washington expect this term might be his last and he will bow to reality and retire rather than run for re-election in 2028. He is already certain to face a primary challenge—potentially from Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
The list of people who might take over as leader of the Senate Democrats is not short, but some may want it more than others, given the many indignities the job demands. So here are the folks being bandied about as potential successors to Schumer, whenever he vacates his suite at the Capitol.
Cory Booker, 56
The New Jersey dynamo currently in his second full term has optimism as boundless as his ambitions. While a 2020 presidential campaign ended weeks before voting even began, he remains a national figure in a party sorely lacking many. He is set to face voters in his state in 2026—and maybe nationally two years after that if he tries to run again for President—Booker has become Democrats’ go-to explanation factory. He was named the chair of Senate Democrats’ communications hub, a role that belies his influence inside the existing Leadership team. He has a knack of seizing the spotlight, as he did earlier this year with a 25-hour, history-making floor speech protesting Trump. And his social media fluency helps him reach well beyond sleepy C-SPAN. For a party looking for a charismatic fighter in one of its most pivotal positions, it might break Booker’s way. But Democrats have to also make a choice: go all-in on Booker as their Senate savior or bet he can run a better White House campaign than the last one.
Catherine Cortez Masto, 61
The Nevadan was one of the eight Democrats who broke rank to end the shutdown, thus putting her firmly in line for scorn from colleagues who wanted the party to hold the line and demand Republicans agree to extend Obamacare subsidies. But Cortez Masto, the only Latina ever elected to the Senate, is one to play the long game. As a member of Schumer’s Leadership team, she has proven a shrewd ear and a skillful pragmatist, one set to face voters again in 2028. While she may have seemed to give Republicans a win right now but she may also have jammed them with a tougher issue with voters.
Ruben Gallego, 45
Most Senators spend their first year in office keeping their head down, grinding into the paces of the deliberate-to-the-point-of-stasis body, and figuring out how to plug into existing power structures. Not Gallego, a five-term House member who made the move to the Senate just this year. A retired Marine Lance Corporal who supported efforts to topple House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Gallego has been critical of his party over its shoddy brand and has urged a new generation of politicians to step up and intervene. Still, the Iraq veteran is a relative newcomer to Washington and something of a cipher from a purple state. Democrats with long memories recall how national work as Senate Minority Leader in 2004 left Democrat Tom Daschle of South Dakota exposed to a Republican challenger named John Thune, currently the Majority Leader. They might rather protect this rising star in Gallego than make him a prime target.
Mark Kelly, 61
Another Arizonan with a maverick streak, Kelly has made a name for himself rejecting partisan defaults—though he was not one of the eight in the Democratic caucus who helped end the shutdown. Elected in 2010 during a special election to finish the last two years of the late Sen. John McCain’s term, Kelly has established himself a straight-to-the-point case study in efficiency. A former pilot during the first Gulf War and later a NASA astronaut, he has worked to break Democrats’ image as gun-shy or weak on the border. A centrist to his core, Kelly nonetheless has proven to be a bipartisan barometer of what is resonating with the most voters, as well as a talented fundraiser. His willingness to compromise might be a major ding on his chances but it may also be just what Democrats need to show any relevance.
Amy Klobuchar, 65
Like Booker, Klobuchar’s 2020 presidential bid ended without much consequence. But she remains one of the toughest lawmakers in the Senate and the chair of her party’s policy shop, the third-ranking member of Leadership. A pragmatist who has watched her party lilt leftward since she first arrived in the Senate after the 2006 election, she has faced criticism from the activist class for being too incremental. Her defenders say she is just being practical like the Midwesterners she represents. That realism may be what leaves her weighing both a promotion in the Senate Leadership structure and launching another White House run.
Chris Murphy, 52
He is a dealmaker in a chamber that demands it. A third-term Senator, he credits the shooting in Newtown, Conn., with his purposeful approach to legislating, especially when it comes to gun safety. In 2022, he quarterbacked the first comprehensive gun law in a quarter century to a win, working with conservative Sens. John Cornyn and Thom Tillis. Eventually, 15 Republican Senators, including Mitch McConnell, got behind the measure, which Joe Biden signed. Murphy, though, lacks the household name ID that the party badly needs; his allies say that gives him room to continue to define himself. The other ding against him: his naked ambition. “For a long portion of my career, I’ve looked like a big bundle of political ambition,” he conceded in 2021. And, no, he is not apologizing for it.
Patty Murray, 75
The third-most-senior Senator, Murray has proven a steady presence in Leadership and is currently in her sixth, six-year term. In 2023, she became the first woman to have cast 10,000 votes in the Senate, an accomplishment reached by only 32 others. A quiet brawler who has helped her party get to yes on thorny issues, she was in the mix to follow Harry Reid as the Democratic Leader in 2017 when he retired, although she ultimately backed Schumer. During a stint as the Senate’s President pro tempore, she was third in line to the presidency, though she never shed her first campaign’s branding of “a mom in tennis shoes” as shorthand for her approach of getting things done. She is no showman, but maybe Democrats’ focus on making good on their promises requires something a bit different.
Brian Schatz, 53
Perhaps the most strident enemy of climate change in the Senate, the Hawaiian has used a green agenda to spark the imagination of colleagues—and to shame Republicans for not believing in scientific consensus. Many of Schatz’s ideas found their way into Joe Biden’s infrastructure bills. When Sen. Daniel Inouye died in 2012, both President Obama and Reid lobbied for Hawaii’s Governor to appoint Schatz—a former Obama campaign aide and at that point the state’s Lieutenant Governor. Since arriving in Washington, Schatz has been a reliable progressive and, most recently, a sharp critic of Trump’s wrecking-ball approach to government. In a party looking for someone with Obama’s charisma and talents, Schatz reminds plenty of Democrats that they might not be totally rudderless.
Chris Van Hollen, 66
As ambitious as they come, the former Hill staffer-turned-principal representing Maryland has enjoyed seats at Leadership’s table in both the House and the Senate. He ran both chambers’ campaign arms with a steady hand through rough cycles and is seen as a capable manager and coalition builder. Now in his second term in the Senate and not up again until 2028, Van Hollen has never stopped eyeing the top job. House colleagues lamented when he decided to switch to the Senate, saying they had expected him to become Speaker one day. Well, he may still get a big prize if Democrats care to split the difference between continuity and change.
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