Yes — on everything that can be counted today, Chuck Schumer will be re-elected Senate majority leader when Senate Democrats choose their leader by secret ballot in early December. No Democrat has announced a challenge to him, his office has confirmed he intends to seek the post, and the Missouri Independent reports the race is unopposed. Schumer needs only a simple majority of a Democratic caucus projected at 54 to 56 members, and the senators-elect publicly refusing to back him number about seven or eight — a protest large enough to make headlines, and nowhere near the 28 or more votes it would take to stop him.
The plain reality is the gap between the noise and the numbers. Democrats have won at least 54 Senate seats, NPR reports, including the two independents who caucus with them, with Alaska and Mississippi still uncalled. Yet the first public fight of the new majority is over who leads it. At least seven incoming senators have said they will not commit to Schumer or will not support him: Juliana Stratton of Illinois will not support him, Adam Hamilton of Kansas says he is not supporting Schumer, Troy Jackson of Maine has told Schumer to his face that he will support somebody else, Peggy Flanagan of Minnesota says it is time for new leadership, Chris Pappas of New Hampshire wants a new generation, James Talarico of Texas wants to hear Schumer's vision first, and Abdul El-Sayed of Michigan backs Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland instead. Petitions against Schumer have passed 100,000 signatures, and the progressive group Indivisible is demanding a contested leadership election, not a coronation.
I told Schumer that I'm going to, you know, support somebody else. So it's no different now. — Troy Jackson, senator-elect from Maine
What the actors themselves claim tells the same story from the other side. Schumer waves the challenge away: the issue, he says, is not him. Van Hollen, the one alternative the holdouts name, has told Bloomberg he does not intend to run for majority leader and has said he is not looking to be the next Democratic leader — he wants any leader to commit to a bold agenda first, which is a demand for promises, not a campaign for the job. And Schumer keeps his allies: Senator Cory Booker says Schumer deserves credit for one of the most historic sweeps in the party's history.
The common-sense principle is simple: a challenge needs a challenger. Votes against a leader when nobody is standing against him are a message, not a mechanism. A caucus cannot elect an empty chair, and a secret ballot with one name on it is a count of loyalty, not a contest.
The consequence is that the holdouts' real power is not the December vote — it is what they can extract before it. Seven or eight promised noes cannot remove Schumer, but they can price their eventual support: commitments on the agenda, on how the majority handles the filibuster — Schumer has already refused to rule out eliminating it — and on how hard the new majority fights President Trump. The caucus could yet grow to 56 if Alaska and Mississippi fall to the Democrats, which would widen Schumer's margin, not narrow it. El-Sayed's refusal is already on the record as the opening shot — he declined to endorse Schumer and backed Van Hollen instead — and the question the December ballot will really answer is not who leads the Senate Democrats, but what the new senators settle for in exchange for letting him.
Schumer gave his own verdict to reporters on Wednesday: "I'll be re-elected as majority leader."