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HJ Hakeem Jeffries Hakeem Jeffries Hakeem Jeffries is the Democratic U.S. Representative for New York's 8th District and House Minority Leader.

“It's not my job to make determinations as to who's the Democratic Party leader. What I can tell you is that Democrats have won elections consistently for the last fourteen months, and so whoever the leader may be, he or she is doing a great job, because literally, we haven't lost a meaningful election in the entirety of the Trump administration.”

Bloomberg This Weekend · February 2026

“It's not my job to make determinations as to who's the Democratic Party leader. What I can tell you is that Democrats have won elections consistently for the last fourteen months, and so whoever the leader may be, he or she is doing a great job, because literally, we haven't lost a meaningful election in the entirety of the Trump administration.” — Hakeem Jeffries, Bloomberg This Weekend

Context

Said on Bloomberg This Weekend in February 2026, when asked who the leader of the Democratic Party is right now. Jeffries pointed to Democratic wins in New Jersey, Virginia, New York and special elections.

Transcript

Bloomberg This Weekend Around 08:46 into the episode
Speaker 4

And who is the leader.

Speaker 2

Of the Democratic Party right now?

Hakeem Jeffries

Democratic leader? We've got great members of the House Democratic Caucus as well that are leading in a wide variety of different ways. It's not my job to make determinations as to who's the Democratic Party leader. What I can tell you is that Democrats have won elections consistently for the last fourteen months, and so whoever the leader may be, he or she is doing a great job, because literally, we haven't lost a meaningful election in the entirety of the Trump administration, winning races up and down the ballot across the country in places like New Jersey, in New York, in Virginia, in California. Certainly during the off year elections last November in Mississippi, in Georgia, three state Supreme Court races that we swept, in Pennsylvania, and then went on to win races in Florida, the Miami mayors race for the first time in thirty years, and of course these special elections that we've seen dramatic overperformance, most recently in Texas by thirty one points and then in Louisiana, the home state of Mike Johnson and Steve Scalise by thirty seven points in terms of an overperformance from the Trump number. So collectively…

Speaker 3

Quite just quickly about messaging, and you're getting to this point that is, I think there are a lot of people who are keen to run against and maybe support candidates who are running against the policies of this president. There are others who are looking for the Democrats to promote and campaign…

Hakeem Jeffries

Yes, well, I think what's been obvious over the last fourteen months, and certainly this was the case no longer deniable by people who suggest that Democrats don't have a message, is that what has united us is the issue of affordability and our commitment to actually drive down the high cost of…

Speaker 4

And we define that very clearly.

Speaker names come from our own diarization. The position is estimated from where the line sits in the episode.

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