Record red-district wins expand the caucus to more than 105 members
Caucus chair Greg Casar said his takeaway from voters in the midterm cycle was not to stay cautious but to spark action. He said the Congressional Progressive Caucus would bring bills on wages, corruption, housing costs, credit card interest rates and child care to the House floor. Casar said the caucus was not worried about vetoes: “The best way to not get something into law is to never pass it,” he said.
The Guardian described House progressives as long dismissed as the Democratic Party’s “leftwing outliers,” as the caucus headed into the next Congress in larger numbers than ever. The Congressional Progressive Caucus said Sunday it would welcome more than 25 new members, including a record number who won in red districts, expanding its House ranks to more than 105 lawmakers in the next Congress. The caucus had 100 members in the last Congress and was heading into the next with its largest delegation. With Democrats set to control both chambers in January, the caucus said it would test its mandate in Congress and use the expanded delegation to push the new Democratic majority to the left. At the Capitol, Casar said, “Progressive ideas won that election,” and “we need to deliver on those promises.”
The caucus endorsed nine candidates in competitive red-to-blue races, and six won, including in seats Trump had previously carried. Randy Villegas won in California, where Trump took the district by two points in 2024, and Katy Padilla Stout won in Texas by eight points in a district Trump carried by 15; both are set to join the Congressional Progressive Caucus. Sam Forstag won in Montana, where Trump won by 11.
Six Democratic Socialists of America-backed candidates also won House seats in safely Democratic districts. Several were at the press conference, including Darializa Avila Chevalier and Claire Valdez of New York, Donavan McKinney of Michigan and Chris Rabb of Pennsylvania.
Progressive leaders said the midterm results showed that voters would back candidates who promised sweeping change. Many newcomers ran on Medicare for All, stronger protections for workers, and ending U.S. arms and military support for Israel over Israel’s war and conduct in Gaza.
The Congressional Progressive Caucus is not the only House Democratic bloc set to expand. The centrist New Democrat Coalition already has 114 members, making it the largest House Democratic caucus, and is expected to add about 39 members, 30 of them from flipped seats. The groups overlap, but the New Democrats’ growth is concentrated in swing seats. Third Way argued that moderates “delivered” the majority and said candidates backed by the more moderate New Democrats, Blue Dogs and WelcomePAC flipped 31 Republican-held House seats, 25 of them in districts Trump won.
Pramila Jayapal, the caucus’s chair emerita, said even she was caught off guard by the surge of wins coming from candidates in risky races who campaigned on Medicare for All. “I don’t think anyone could have expected this level of wave support,” she said. Jayapal said the caucus planned to take members on the road to promote Medicare for All, including in red states such as South Carolina and Florida.
She pointed to Alabama, where Shomari Figures, a representative who beat a Republican gerrymander to win reelection, signed onto the bill six to eight months ago. Jayapal said Republicans tested attacks against him in his Trump-leaning district, but the Medicare for All attack tested so badly that they never ran it. “Healthcare has collapsed across the country,” Jayapal said, “and I think the cruelty of that also gives us this amazing opportunity to really, once and for all, reform this system.”
Asked whether the caucus would back Hakeem Jeffries for speaker, Casar did not commit. “Every single member here is going to have their individual vote,” he said. He said the caucus would work with leadership on a direction that delivers on the promises members made on the campaign trail, “from the most moderate to the most progressive.” So far, none of the incoming members endorsed by the Democratic Socialists of America had committed to supporting Jeffries.
Among the newcomers to the Congressional Progressive Caucus was Adam Hamawy of New Jersey, a former U.S. Army combat surgeon who volunteered at a Gaza hospital in 2024 during Israel’s military campaign and blockade in Gaza. Hamawy would become the state’s first Muslim member of Congress. He said voters had sent a clear message. “The American people voted. They want change, and the priorities stay the same,” he said. Asked what he wanted to prioritize, he said, “I want to pass Medicare for All, and I want to stop this genocide [in Gaza].”
Brad Lander of New York, Scott Wiener of California and Daniel Biss of Illinois, all incoming progressive House Democrats at the press conference, wrote to Israel’s ambassador on Friday demanding the release of Abed Abu Shehadeh. Abu Shehadeh, a Palestinian journalist and Israeli citizen, was detained at his home in Jaffa on election night on suspicion of contact with a foreign agent. His lawyers said the case concerned a single interview with an exiled Palestinian intellectual and former member of Israel’s parliament. He was released Sunday without charges.
Lander said, “I didn’t expect it would be the first thing I would lead a ‘dear colleague’ on,” and “but it was very moving to do something together with Daniel [Biss].” Rabb, one of the Democratic Socialists of America-backed newcomers, cast himself as a bridge-builder. “There’s a lot of people who don’t define themselves with these political labels that the average voter doesn’t care about,” he told reporters. Rabb said voters want to “get rid of the type of corruption that has been normalized here,” and he intends to find common ground with colleagues wherever they sit on the ideological spectrum.
Whether the progressive wing sets the majority’s agenda will depend on how the new members vote in the speaker’s race and beyond. Casar said he was not trying to outdo other caucuses. “We didn’t even try to be the biggest we’ve ever been,” he said. “It just turns out we are.”