Rep. Jim Clyburn, the influential South Carolina Democrat who mentored Rep. Haley Stevens and endorsed her Senate bid, said he would support expelling her from the House Democratic Caucus after she backed a Republican.
“I think I would vote for that,” Clyburn told Politico, referring to an expulsion resolution, in an interview that aired Friday. “That’s a classic example of putting people over politics.”
Last weekend, Clyburn had been scheduled to appear with Stevens and her primary opponent, Abdul El-Sayed, at a church in Detroit — a stop intended to bridge any remaining party divides before Election Day. Instead, Stevens attended another event with Republican Mike Rogers and endorsed him the same day.
El-Sayed won the Senate contest. Many in the party viewed Stevens’ move as a “despicable betrayal” — though most rank-and-file Democrats have not called outright for the lawmaker’s expulsion before she leaves office in January. On Monday, the day after Stevens’ surprise endorsement, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries confirmed that he was weighing whether to expel her in the coming weeks.
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Clyburn’s remarks this week were a departure from the praise he gave the Michigan lawmaker earlier this year.
“I’ve been proud to have Haley by my side through some of the toughest fights against Donald Trump,” he said in his July endorsement of Stevens, calling her “a fighter for Michigan.”
The South Carolina Democrat is an influential voice on party strategy and a kingmaker whose endorsement propelled Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign. His annual fish fry has become a regular stop for presidential candidates aiming to win the South.
During the interview, Clyburn also rejected the idea that El-Sayed’s victory belonged solely to progressives, saying it mattered to the entire party.
“It was important to me for him to get elected, not because of which wing of the party he was in. It was because he was in the party,” he told Politico.
A handful of House Democrats have since called to remove Stevens from the caucus, including Reps. Delia Ramirez of Illinois, Lateefah Simon of California, Marc Veasey of Texas and Emily Randall of Washington.
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