President Barack Obama isn’t the only prominent Democrat keeping a low profile on the campaign trail this fall.
While top GOP figures like Mitt Romney and would-be 2016 Republican presidential contenders are out raising money and support for GOP candidates — and themselves — Obama and the party’s two top congressional leaders, Rep. Nancy Pelosi and Sen. Harry Reid, have sought to minimize the opposition's ability to make them prime election targets.
But Obama, as well as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, have still played a major role by raising millions of dollars to help Democratic candidates maintain parity in the megabucks race for campaign advertising.
In a larger sense, however, the fact that the three top Democratic office-holders are sufficiently unpopular they need to limit their public campaigning is a signal the party is more than overdue to match the GOP in developing a new generation of leaders that would help give it more of a forward-looking image.
Though it’s far too late to reverse the drag stemming from Obama’s low job approval, time will relieve that problem since Obama’s term ends in two years. Long before then, he may be rivaled if not superseded in the limelight by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, assuming the party’s 2016 presidential front-runner enters the White House race.
On Capitol Hill, though, Democrats show little sign of an impending transformation to new, younger leadership.
Their problem is especially evident in the House, where the GOP earlier this year promoted Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California, 49, to majority leader and Rep. Steve Scalise of Louisiana, 49, to majority whip. Though Rep. John Boehner of Ohio, nearing 66, remains Speaker, all three GOP leaders are at least a decade younger than their Democratic counterparts, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California, 74; Minority Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland, 75; and Assistant Minority Leader James Clyburn of South Carolina, 74.
Pelosi, who Politico said has personally raised $80 million for House candidates in 2013-14, has consistently said she will remain the party’s leader even if Democrats fail for the second straight election to regain the majority they lost in 2010. All signs are that she remains personally popular with House Democrats, and the number of more conservative Democrats who might resist her liberal image has shrunk in recent elections.
Besides, knowledgeable Democrats have long said she won’t step down as long as Hoyer is next in line, alluding to a decades-long emnity that dates back to their days as interns in the same Maryland senator’s office.
By staying, however, they block prospects for promoting such younger leadership candidates as Reps. Xavier Becerra of California, 56; Chris van Hollen of Maryland, 55; Steve Israel of New York, 56; or Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida, 48.
The age disparity is less evident in the Senate where Reid is 75, and his GOP counterpart, Mitch McConnell, is 72. Neither are popular figures, but there are no signs either is planning to leave, assuming McConnell survives his current tough re-election fight. In fact, Reid has already salted away nearly $20 million for his 2016 re-election race.
This year, he has attended some 116 meetings in 15 cities to help the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and two “independent” political action committees, reportedly raising more than $50 million alone for the Senate Majority PAC.
He also used his role controlling the Senate calendar to protect Democratic senators from having to vote on measures passed by the GOP-controlled House that Obama would have vetoed.
As a master of senatorial procedures, he will be an effective leader if his party again finds itself in the negative, occasionally obstructionist role that the GOP has played in recent years.
But like Pelosi, he would not be nearly as effective a public party spokesperson as his deputies, Sens. Dick Durbin of Illinois, nearing 70, and Charles Schumer of New York, 64.
Especially in the House, many members would like to see a change in leadership. But it seems highly likely that it would take a further cataclysm, such as loss of the presidency in 2016, for a majority to reach the conclusion that the nation’s oldest party needs to give itself a new face.
Carl P. Leubsdorf is the former Washington bureau chief of The Dallas Morning News. His email address iscarl.p.leubsdorf@gmail .com.
