Hakeem Jeffries Poised to Become First Black Speaker as Democrats Retake the House

WASHINGTON — House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries is in line to become the first Black speaker of the House after Democrats won back control of the chamber in Tuesday’s midterm elections, a change that would put the 56-year-old New Yorker second in line to the presidency.

Jeffries faces a vote of his colleagues when the new Congress convenes on Jan. 3. House Democrats will first choose their candidate in a closed-door caucus vote later this month, and no Democrat is seen as a serious challenger to Jeffries, according to Democratic aides cited by Reuters.

A vote in January, after a caucus choice

The speaker runs the 435-member House, deciding which bills reach a vote and which do not. The job is the only leadership position in Congress set out in the Constitution, and it sits second in the presidential line of succession, after Vice President JD Vance.

Jeffries would take the gavel from Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican, after four years of Republican control of the House. He would be the first Democratic speaker since Nancy Pelosi, who stepped aside as the party’s leader after the 2022 elections. Jeffries has led House Democrats for the past four years with her backing.

His leadership team is set to move up with him. Rep. Katherine Clark of Massachusetts is expected to become majority leader, and Rep. Pete Aguilar of California is expected to become majority whip, according to the Associated Press.

What Jeffries says he will do first

In a letter to House Democrats on Wednesday, Jeffries said he wants to serve as the next speaker and laid out three areas where he wants the new majority to act: affordability, accountability and American values. “America is back!” he wrote.

At the Democrats’ watch party on Tuesday night, where supporters chanted “Speaker! Speaker!” Jeffries said the election was a demand for change. “This is not a partisan moment. This is a patriotic one,” he said. “The American people are crying out for transformational change. We hear you.”

He has promised a 100-day agenda aimed at lowering the cost of living and opening investigations into the Trump administration. Reuters reported that he pledged to push bills reversing steep Medicaid cuts enacted on July 4, 2025, and to investigate the administration’s dealings with corporate executives who donated heavily to the president’s campaigns and projects. He has stopped short of saying the House would try to impeach President Donald Trump for a third time.

An aide cited by Reuters said Jeffries could open with bills that unite Democrats, including an expanded child tax credit, a housing tax credit, an end to the war in Iran, restored clean energy subsidies and renewed health care subsidies. Harder votes would follow, including raising the debt limit and approving federal spending to keep the government open.

From Brooklyn to the speaker’s chair

Jeffries, 56, was born in Brooklyn, the son of an Air Force veteran and a social worker. He told the Associated Press that growing up during the crack epidemic in New York gave him a drive to improve life for working people in his neighborhood. He represents parts of the Brooklyn district once held by Shirley Chisholm, the first Black woman elected to Congress.

He earned a bachelor’s degree from the State University of New York at Binghamton, a master’s degree in public policy from Georgetown University and graduated magna cum laude from New York University School of Law. He worked as a corporate lawyer and served in the New York State Assembly before winning a House seat in 2012, after challenging a 30-year incumbent.

A member of the Congressional Black Caucus, Jeffries follows Joseph Rainey, the first Black American elected to the House, in 1870. Rainey never held the speakership, though he was the first Black lawmaker to preside over the chamber with the gavel.

Jeffries still has work to do inside his own party. Reuters reported that some newly elected progressives have not committed to backing him, including Rep.-elect Darializa Avila Chevalier of New York, who has said the next speaker must support voting rights reforms, public housing investment, a halt to offensive weapons for Israel and universal health care. Jeffries has been cool toward a Medicare for All plan, which many moderates fear would cost too much, and pro-Israel groups are among his largest campaign contributors.

“The question is what he has to give them to get them on board,” Michele Swers, a Georgetown University professor of American government, told Reuters.

Trump has taunted Jeffries in public and in private, at one point posting a fake photo of the Democratic leader wearing a sombrero outside the White House, according to the Associated Press.

Reporting based on coverage by the Associated Press and Reuters.