Minnesota Senator-elect Peggy Flanagan used her first news conference after winning election to call on Senate Democrats to replace Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, a day after her own victory helped hand Democrats control of both chambers of Congress.
“I am tremendously grateful for Chuck Schumer’s leadership,” Flanagan said at the event, according to the Minnesota Reformer, before pivoting to argue the party needs a change at the top.
“One of the things that we heard last night, resoundingly across the country, is that we are in … a new movement in this country,” Flanagan said. “Many of us were elected who refused corporate PAC money, who are beholden only to the people who elected us and are ready to fight for bold change. And so I think it’s time for new leadership.”
Flanagan did not name anyone she thinks should take Schumer’s place. Schumer, who has led Senate Democrats for roughly a decade, faces a leadership vote in December, before the new Congress is seated in January. No Democrat had formally entered a race against him as of Wednesday. If he retains the post, he would become majority leader once again given the party’s new control of the chamber.
Flanagan’s case rests on the results themselves: she pointed to a wave of incoming Democrats who rejected corporate PAC money and campaigned on more sweeping policy promises, framing Tuesday’s outcome as a mandate for a different kind of leadership.
She is not alone. Two other Democrats headed to the Senate next year, Abdulrahman El-Sayed of Michigan and Juliana Stratton of Illinois, have also said they intend to oppose Schumer for the leadership post, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Schumer went into the midterms with broad backing from Senate Democrats, the Associated Press reported in October, though he had taken heat from within his own party in 2025 after voting to advance a Republican spending bill that averted a government shutdown. Democratic senators interviewed by the AP before Election Day said they did not see an obvious successor waiting in the wings.
Flanagan’s own win was decisive. She defeated Republican Michele Tafoya by 10.15 percentage points, keeping the Minnesota seat in Democratic hands after Sen. Tina Smith decided not to seek another term. According to unofficial results posted by the Minnesota secretary of state at 7:58 p.m. EST Wednesday, with all 4,105 precincts reporting, Flanagan took 1,520,865 votes (53.71 percent) to Tafoya’s 1,233,464 (43.56 percent).
