Gee ... who should we cheer in this match-up? The man who declared a “big tent” welcome to Marxists and Islamists? Or the man who flew to Central America to have drinks with a domestic abuse and human trafficking suspect, deported as an illegal alien?
Decisions, decisions.
Chuck Schumer’s big tent finally backfired on him last night. After several days of rebellion within the ranks of the Senate Democrat caucus, Chris Van Hollen announced his candidacy for Senate Majority Leader. He will likely get support from the radicals that Schumer welcomed to the party:
Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland announced on Thursday that he would challenge Senator Chuck Schumer of New York for majority leader, setting up a clash among Democrats just as they were celebrating their new majority and planning for a takeover of Congress in January.
The move by Mr. Van Hollen, a progressive Democrat elected to the Senate in 2016 after seven terms in the House representing the Washington, D.C. suburbs, comes as some Democratic senators and activists have called for an alternative to Mr. Schumer, a moderate whom they regard as too tied to the party establishment to lead a newly energized party forward in the next Congress.
Mr. Van Hollen, who is also said to be weighing a run for president in 2028, had emerged as the favorite to challenge Mr. Schumer for the post and had expressed increasing willingness to do so in recent days.
Senate Democrats are scheduled to vote behind closed doors on Dec. 1 to determine who will be their leader when their party takes the Senate majority on Jan. 4.
Schumer brought this on himself, and not just in his “big tent” idiocy while socialists plotted their takeover. Schumer has spent two-plus decades as a maximalist partisan infighter, at first under Harry Reid’s tutelage and then on his own during the Trump era. Schumer helped stoke TDS and kept raising expectations about stopping Trump, the Supreme Court, and “global warming” that he could never meet in reality.
A decade of futility in Trump derangement infuriated progressives and created the demand for leadership change. Schumer made the mistake in this cycle thinking that he could escort that scorpion across the pond on his back one more time, only this time, Schumer’s big tent allowed more scorpions than he can handle now.
Van Hollen, on the other hand, is a fool for challenging Schumer in this environment. Let’s say Van Hollen wins. Then what? What will Van Hollen pass that Schumer wouldn’t? And what can Van Hollen do with Trump in the White House, ready to veto anything on the progressive-Marxist agenda? The next two years will be hard enough for Schumer, who might have been able to work with Trump on some moderate reforms. Van Hollen won’t work with Trump, which means that progressives will get yet another two years of abject futility. Van Hollen will be even more inclined to dump the filibuster, and then when that doesn’t help – because Trump has a veto and Van Hollen won’t have 67 votes – both progressives and moderates will resent Van Hollen for doing nothing.
The smart move from progressives would have been to force Schumer to run the caucus the next two years and then blame him for not winning anything. That might have built enthusiasm in the 2028 cycle for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez or even Van Hollen as the leftist banner-carrier at the top of the presidential ticket. When Van Hollen fumbles, and that’s a when rather than an if, the radicals will get disillusioned all over again.
Soooo … who do we root for? Whoever’s passing the popcorn.
Addendum: Schumer says he has the votes:
Schumer has already said he has the votes needed to continue serving as the leader.
“I welcome any discussion about the future of our caucus and the important work ahead. I’m proud of what we’ve accomplished together — 55 seats and counting is an amazing result — and I have the votes to continue serving as Democratic Leader. I look forward to leading our new Democratic majority and delivering for the American people,” Schumer said in a statement.
Does he? The vote should be ... clarifying. So should what follows it. If Schumer wins, the rebels had better get used to their new committee assignments.