Hakeem Jeffries bounced onto the stage in Washington DC, on Tuesday night with the glow of a freshly-coronated king.
'America is back,' announced the next Speaker of the House; his fellow Brooklynite, rapper Biggie Smalls, blasting out to the crowd. Jeffries called the midterms 'a change election,' and said the country had declared: 'Enough of the extremism.'
Come January 3, he may find members of his party have other ideas.
America has elected a slew of local, state and federal officials more left-wing than ever before.
Jeffries's own caucus now contains at least eight members of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) – an increase from two during the previous term. Among them is a woman who advocated for 'a world without prisons or police' and demanded the US 'literally, abolish the border.'
His colleague in the Senate – fellow Brooklynite Chuck Schumer, the next Senate Majority Leader – will have to contend with Abdul El-Sayed in his ranks, arguably among the most far-left Senators ever elected. And he almost had a fully-fledged member of the DSA by his side: Angie Nixon narrowly lost her Florida Senate race.
It is all music to Ashik Siddique's ears.
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