Minnesota Senator-elect Peggy Flanagan has barely had time to celebrate her election victory, but she is already challenging one of the most powerful figures in Washington.
Flanagan said Wednesday that Senate Democrats should replace longtime leader Chuck Schumer, arguing that voters had demanded a new direction after the November 3 midterms. Schumer faces a Democratic leadership election before the new Congress takes office in January.
“I am tremendously grateful for Chuck Schumer’s leadership and what he has done over the last many years,” Flanagan said, before adding that “it is time for new leadership.”
The intervention comes immediately after Democrats won control of Congress, ending the Republican majorities that entered the midterm election. Reuters reported that Democrats made sweeping gains nationwide, while Minnesota Democrats also captured control of the state Legislature.
That makes Flanagan’s challenge less about dislodging Republican control, which voters have already done at the ballot box, and more about what Democrats intend to do with the power they have just won.
For some left-leaning Minnesotans, the answer appears to be to move quickly.
‘Throwing Her Weight Around Already’
Reaction in Minnesota’s online political community to a graphic of Flannagan’s announcement via Bring Me The News was immediate, with supporters treating Flanagan’s comments as evidence that the newly elected senator intends to push her party as aggressively as she pushed against Republicans during the campaign.
On the r/stateofMN subreddit, one commenter reacted: “Damn. Throwing her weight around already. Go get em, Peggy!!” Another said the intervention showed the kind of “urgency and insistence” they wanted from elected representatives.
Others called for pressure on Democratic leadership in both chambers, reflecting frustration among some progressive voters who do not see defeating Republicans as the end of the argument. Their concern is what Democrats do after winning.
Flanagan has not named a preferred replacement for Schumer. She told reporters that she could not say exactly who should take over, but argued voters were ready for “new voices and new leadership in the Senate caucus.”
The timing gives those comments extra weight. Flanagan defeated Republican Michele Tafoya to keep Minnesota’s Senate seat in Democratic hands, becoming the first Native woman elected to the U.S. Senate.
Now, before she has even been sworn in, she is entering a fight over who should lead the newly empowered Senate Democrats.
Minnesota voters sent Flanagan to Washington promising change. Her first major move suggests she does not intend to wait quietly for senior Democrats to decide what that change looks like.
