Insurgent House Democrats are opening a new front in the generational war roiling the party, pushing to put term limits on committee leadership roles.
When the lawmakers return to Washington after the midterms, some Democrats plan to bring up a proposal in their caucus organizational meetings that would limit how many years leaders remain in top committee stops, according to multiple House Democrats familiar with the plans.
“It will only happen if members approve it. It’s an uphill battle, but I think the tide is turning,” said one of the House Democrats who was granted anonymity to address internal deliberations. “We are working on it. It’s a very touchy topic.”
A second House Democrat said that next Congress, “there’ll be many more members that are five terms or less” and there is an “appetite” to add limits so that younger and newer members can move up.
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The new discussion around term limits comes at a time when the Democratic base is calling for new faces in the party and multiple incumbents have lost primaries to younger, more progressive candidates. Already, Democrats are starting to mount challenges for top committee slots: Rep. Jahana Hayes of Connecticut announced she’d challenge Rep. Bobby Scott of Virginia for the top job on the House Education and Workforce Committee. Scott ascended to that position in 2015.
Unlike Democrats, Republicans impose a strict six-year limit on lawmakers serving as chairs or as ranking members when their party is in the minority. The first House Democrat said the limits could be similar to Republicans’ but without counting the years as ranking members, though the details on the restrictions are still being worked through. The lawmaker also said that an additional proposal is to allow committee leaders who have reached their limit to request a waiver.
Rep. Mike Levin of California, the chair of the House Democratic Committee on Caucus Rules, said the panel has held multiple listening sessions where the seniority issue came up.
“There are a number of members that obviously have great interest in this. There’s been discussion of grandfathering in everybody who’s already in a ranking member or chair position,” Levin said. “There’s others that disagree with that, so there’s been no consensus on that, nor has there been any finalized proposal or anything like that. We’re still working on it.”
Levin said that the committee would work with members who are interested in the rule change to “formulate specific proposals that will be voted on.” Once there is a proposal, it will be voted on by the entire caucus rules committee, and then brought to the full House Democratic caucus for a vote in November.
“My hope is that we can build some internal consensus on what would be fair, or I should say, not just what would be fair, but what would actually earn the support of our members,” Levin added.
The issue is especially touchy for Congressional Black Caucus members who have historically supported seniority rules. Those rules have helped secure top slots for Black members who were long denied power in Congress. And the proposal comes as fewer Black lawmakers are expected in the next Congress because of Republicans’ redistricting efforts, potentially reducing the caucus’ influence.
Maryland Rep. Glenn Ivey told The Washington Sun that a proposal for term limits is a “mixed bag,” pointing at the House GOP’s practices.
“Watching what the Republicans are doing, they’re just playing musical chairs sometimes with these committee chairmanships to sort of circumvent what the goal is,” Ivey said. “On the Democratic side, we’ve had very young members — Robert Garcia for example — rise to the top.”
Three Democrats pointed to Rep. Frank Pallone (D-New Jersey), who has been the top Democrat in the House Energy and Commerce Committee since 2015, as one of the biggest opponents to term limits.
“Over the years, he’s been very adamant that he is against it. Very, very adamant, and talks to all the members saying, ‘Don’t be for it,’” a third House Democrat told The Sun. “He feels like he’s waited a long time to get there and he doesn’t want it to change.”
In a statement to The Sun, Pallone said, “our current system is democracy — every two years, members have the freedom to run and vote for the best person to lead committees based on merit. Open campaigns lead to healthy debate, diverse leaders, and a stronger caucus.”
Other senior Democrats are also likely to challenge the term limits efforts in November.
Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin, a popular House Democrat who has been the top Democrat of two powerful committees — first the Oversight Committee and now Judiciary — called himself “a pretty good example of why we don’t need term limits, because we do have real and open elections on the Democratic side.”
“There are people who may want to run for a chairmanship who feel like there’s too much of a presumption of seniority, and it’s only a presumption, it’s a rebuttable presumption,” Raskin added. “I can see where it’s coming from, but we’ve also seen a lot of turnover and fluidity in the ranking positions and the chair positions.”
Yet, Mississippi Rep. Bennie Thompson, who has been the top Democrat in the House Homeland Security Committee since its inception in 2005, told The Sun, “I got to be chair based on my seniority on the committee.”
“If you ask Bennie Thompson, I support seniority and the current rule. But I will say if you want to debate it and put it to a vote, officer. Fine. That doesn’t mean I’ll change my vote,” Thompson added.
Some of the lawmakers in line to become chairs if Democrats win the majority in November, such as Garcia, a younger member from California, are not opposed to limits.
“I’ve told folks already in the caucus that I could support that,” said Garcia, who is in line to chair the House Oversight Committee. “I’ve told folks already in the caucus that I could support that.”
“As a new person, I think that having new leaders and there being a debate on that is healthy,” Garcia added.
Previous attempts by Democrats to place term limits on committee chairs have failed. Illinois Rep. Bill Foster led an effort in 2022 to set a six-year limit for committee leaders, counting time served as chair and ranking member together. House Democrats rejected the proposal in a 138-63 vote.
The fact that the proposal got support from around a third of the caucus signaled that such an effort would “eventually” succeed, the third anonymous House Democrat told The Sun.
“A lot of the younger members don’t want to be in Congress for 30 years before they get a chance to chair a major committee. My guess is that if it doesn’t change this time, it’s definitely changing the next time,” the lawmaker said. “It’s just a matter of time. People are watching their Republican classmates come in and have opportunity to chair major committees and leave instead of having to be here for a long time.”
Rep. Gregory Meeks, the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee,opposes committee leadership term limits and told The Sun that House Democrats have “created many opportunities” for younger members to move up.
Under the current House Democratic caucus rules, each committee must have a vice chair or vice ranking member position that goes to a member who has served in the committee for five terms or less and is considered “an opportunity for a junior Member to gain insight and experience into the workings of the committee.”
“Contrary to some belief, it does take a little bit of time to understand how this place functions,” Meeks said. “I sat and I watched and I learned for a long period of time.”
But not all Democrats want to wait long to rise through the ranks.
“A lot of us don’t want to stay here forever,” the third House Democrat said.
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