House Dems Leadership Shuffle

The departure of House Democratic Caucus Chairman Rahm Emanuel (D-IL) for his new job as President-Elect Barack Obama's White House Chief of Staff would ordinarily be expected to set off a mad scramble for his vacated leadership post, as well as a chain reaction to fill new openings, as those lower on the leadership ladder jumped from their rungs to reach up.

But a funny thing is happening this time around:

A number of House Democrats have backed off potential challenges to incumbent leaders, a sign that Speaker Nancy Pelosi may be orchestrating a quiet transition into the 111th Congress, aides said.

Rep. Chris Van Hollen’s (Md.) decision to remain chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and not challenge Rep. John Larson (Conn.) for the Democratic Caucus chairmanship is only one in a number of instances where House Democrats have resisted party infighting in the week before the internal reorganization.

Earlier, Van Hollen had said he was looking to move on from the DCCC chair, as chairmen often do, choosing to leave on an up note rather than facing the prospect of having to outperform a successful cycle. But it appears he's since reversed course, likely leaving Larson unchallenged for Caucus chair.

Ordinarily, we see the highest ranking leadership posts -- Speaker, Majority Leader, Whip and Caucus chair -- going to the top fundraisers and party builders. Typically, that means those who use their "leadership PACs" to raise and distribute the most campaign cash to the most of their voting colleagues in the Caucus. It's rarely an openly ideological race, which sometimes surprises people, given that it's a contest for Congressional leadership. In the 2006 race for Majority Leader between Steny Hoyer and Jack Murtha, for instance, many were surprised to see such great numbers of progressive stalwarts voting for Hoyer over the then-breakout star of anti-war sentiment, Murtha. But the fact was that Hoyer had been building toward that election for years, breaking his back raising millions for his fellow House Democrats and helping them through tough spots, whereas by comparison Murtha had only just begun. According to the data avaialble at OpenSecrets.org, while Murtha had disbursed $154,000 to colleagues during the 2006 cycle, he hadn't even established a leadership PAC before then, whereas Hoyer had raised and distributed over $3 million since 1998.

The pattern largely holds in other races as well. In her rise through the leadership ranks, Nancy Pelosi has always been a top fundraiser. And now-Senator Bob Menendez similarly fueled his rise to the Caucus chairmanship with his fundraising skills. Indeed, a quick review of the listings of leadership PACs sorted by the amounts raised and distributed serves as a virtual roster of the bipartisan House leadership. Senate posts are sometimes less obviously related to leadership PACs, though you'll almost always find the highest ranking Senate leaders well inside the top third of any fundraising list. But in the House, you can practically set your watch by it.

But let's get back to that funny thing that's happening this year. In addition to the change in direction by Van Hollen, there's a similar phenomenon among contenders for the Vice Chairmanship of the Caucus, current deputy whips Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) and Joe Crowley (D-NY) are also backing off. And what does that mean?

The stepping aside of Schakowsky and Crowley would pave the way for Rep. Xavier Becerra (Calif.) — currently assistant to the Speaker and a key Pelosi (Calif.) ally — to waltz into the vice chairmanship largely unchallenged. Rep. Kendrick Meek (Fla.) remains interested in the job and is still gauging support, and some other members, including Ohio Rep. Marcy Kaptur, are rumored to be interested in the race.

Follow my thinking here for a minute. Here are the OpenSecrets.org figures on leadership PAC disbursements for the contenders for Vice Chair:

Ranked by dollar totals for the 2008 cycle, Crowley is currently 9th among House Dems Democrat in terms of campaign support for colleagues, raising some $285,400. Meek clocks in next with $109,724, though that puts him in the #15 spot. Murtha, George Miller (D-CA), Earl Blumenauer (D-OR), John Tanner (D-TN) and Bart Stupak (D-MI) raised more than Meek, but less than Crowley. Next up was Schakowsky in the 18 spot, with $95,500.

After that, though, there was a serious drop-off, with Becerra and Kaptur raising just $12,000 and $5,000 this cycle, respectively.

Now, 2008 is by no means the only cycle that counts in these things. But earlier cycles tell a similar story up at the top of this class of contenders. Crowley led the 2006 giving too among this list of conteders too, with $181,500. Meek was a distant second with $49,000. But Neither Schakowsky nor Kaptur appear to have had an active leadership PAC for the 2006 cycle. Becerra was good for just $18,000. (No value judgment there, by the way! Xavier Becerra is certainly "worth" more than $18,000.) Earlier lists show Crowley with $34,000 in 2004, $14,000 in 2002, and $5,000 in 2000. Meek doesn't show up in the leadership PAC giving lists prior to '06. And as for Becerra, he didn't register in the 2004 lists, popped up with $5,229 in giving in 2002, $9,800 in 2000, and $18,200 in 1998.

Becerra's record is a little bit unusual for a player who's moving up in the leadership in that it doesn't show a steady progression over the years. The 1998 high point is probably best accounted for by the fact that Becerra served as chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus in that period -- a position that would have helped him raise additional funds, as well as increased his political need to disburse them to colleagues.

What's interesting, of course, is that Becerra now finds himself well-positioned for the vice chairmanship despite having been far outpaced in the proxy race as measured by the money game. How did that happen?

"It sounds like Pelosi is calling the shots and doesn’t want any big fight for any of these positions," a top Democratic aide close to leadership said.

[...]

Pelosi also appears to have agreed to transfer Becerra’s assistant-to-the-Speaker portfolio to Van Hollen — who last week said publicly he was looking for a broader influence over policy. It was unclear what would happen to the assistant-to-the-Speaker position, which Pelosi personally selected Becerra for two years ago.

Isn't that interesting? Pelosi's using her influence to help move a trusted ally into a higher leadership position in contravention to all convention on these matters, taking the money out of the game and boosting a leadership candidate based on... leadership. At least insofar as that's defined by helping the Speaker design and implement policy. What a concept!

There are different ways to read this, of course. On the one hand, you could see it as a much-needed reform, relieving up-and-coming leaders with the smarts and abilities to move the Caucus forward from the crushing burden of constant fundraising and internal politicking, and allowing them instead to concentrate on actually getting a job done. But on the other hand, it's a Speaker imposing her will on a Caucus that's gotten used to a certain set of ground rules that, while probably unfair and hopelessly skewed toward those from wealthier districts (or who could plausibly stroll into such districts and start asking for money), were at least clear, overt, and understandable.

But we really shouldn't gloss over that bias that a fundraising-based system imposes on the leadership selection process. If you think about it, it's not hard at all to understand how this system can tend to skew the leadership toward the conservative side of the scale, and impose something of a racial or at least socioeconomic filter, too. And although I'm generalizing, I think it's probably a fair guess off the top of my head to say that a good portion of the people who get filtered out by this game by the economic demographics of their district (i.e., places where there's not a huge fundraising base to be found) skew toward the progressive side of the scale.

Still, as intriguing as this notion of stepping in to promote progressive allies is -- and by most measures (including, let's say, Progressive Punch scores) you'd have to count Becerra as a far more consistent progressive than Crowley -- it's worth noting that it would represent at least a partial departure from a sort of parallel seniority system. But I think it's a good one. We've all had our gripes about the role seniority plays in the committee system, but the members of the usually comparatively progressive Congressional Black Caucus, among others, have stood steadfastly by it. Why? Because seniority was a game they could play at on an even footing, no matter what the economic demographics of their districts were. Some of today's titans of the House, most notably John Conyers and Charlie Rangel, chair important and influential committees because the rules of ascension were clearly laid out (albeit in the days when minority Representatives were a relative rarity), and they did what was required of them: get reelected, a lot.

The leadership ladder, though, is a tougher nut to crack without money, precisely because it's based on money. There have been minorities who've climbed the ladder before, of course. But I can only think of three, and none of them came before the late 1980s.

So it's looking like Speaker Pelosi's imposing a little bit of order on the transition to the 111th Congress, and minimizing the disruption caused by Rahm Emanuel's departure. The top three spots in leadership remain unchanged, of course. Larson's move to the Caucus chair position is perhaps a bit of a retreat on progressiveness, and the race might have gone the other way based on fundraising, where Van Hollen outspent Larson over the past two cycles and had the advantage of superior candidate contact as DCCC chair. But the vice chair slot -- though less strictly governed solely by dollar amounts -- has definitely been shaken up, positioning Becerra for the chance to impact policy, not to mention raise some money and start to make his way up.

I'm liking that shake-up, in isolation. But it's surely giving short shrift to the very progressive Schakowsky, who put nearly $100,000 into the system this cycle and comes away empty handed. With two Illinois colleagues moving into power positions down Pennsylvania Avenue, maybe she'll find some new avenues for working her way back into the leadership game in the future.