House Democratic leadership publicly scolded Reps. Jared Golden and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez for breaking party lines to bail out Republicans on a key vote Tuesday.
Page A17From§Eachthe early bird edition — 2 September 2026
Jeffries vows 'serious response' to two defectors, three weeks after The Nation reported Kushner had already out-maneuvered him.
As it ran on the front
House Democratic leadership moved fast this week, which is to say they moved to a room and talked. On Tuesday, Reps. Jared Golden of Maine and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington crossed the floor to help Republican leaders advance a slate of messaging bills that were otherwise headed for defeat — the kind of vote that exists to be photographed, not counted. By Wednesday morning the caucus was huddling to weigh changes to internal party rules, and Hakeem Jeffries was promising, on the record, a "serious response." That is the plan so far. A serious response is coming. Worth noting what it is not: not a whip count, not a primary threat, not — despite the vocabulary — a response yet. It is a promise of a response, issued the way a company issues a statement that it takes the matter seriously, which is usually the last thing said before nothing happens.
This is, in fairness, on brand. Three weeks earlier, on August 24th, The Nation ran a piece titled "How Jared Kushner Snookered Hakeem Jeffries," documenting the leader's habit of mistaking comity for strategy while the other side plays chess. Jeffries was out-maneuvered then too — no vote, no defection, just a quieter kind of losing, the kind that doesn't make the New York Post. Correction: it did, eventually, three weeks later, wearing a different hat. The defectors didn't invent the problem. They noticed it was unguarded.…
…(cont) Discipline, it turns out, is scarce inside the caucus in more than one direction. On August 27th, the Washington Examiner reported that fourteen House Democrats in battleground districts had taken more than $30,000 combined from Rep. Jimmy Gomez, who faces allegations of sexual misconduct from a former staffer. Asked whether they'd return the money, all fourteen declined to answer. No serious response was promised there either — no deadline, no whip count, not even a press release. Just the same silence that let two members walk across the aisle unbothered a week later.
So the caucus enters September with a rules discussion, a promise, and a pattern: the threats arrive after the vote, the money stays after the allegation, and the man who lost the floor in August is the one drafting September's memo on discipline. Serious response pending. Actually — correction — response pending. The "serious" part was never confirmed.
“They call it a "serious response," but nobody's naming a bill, a primary, or a dollar figure — that's not a plan, that's a press release. Fourteen of Jeffries's own members are sitting on thirty grand from a colleague accused of harassment and won't even say if they'll give it back, and that's the same leadership promising to get tough on two members who bailed out the GOP. Kushner already ate his lunch three weeks ago; this week two more members figured out nobody's watching the store.”
“A "serious response" shows real leadership — Speaker Jeffries is taking control, convening the caucus, weighing rule changes, this is decisive — well, it's a meeting about maybe changing rules, but that's how serious people operate, did I say serious? Because three weeks ago The Nation ran a whole piece about him getting out-maneuvered by Kushner, so maybe don't print that part. Forget I brought it up.”
The receipts
Fourteen House Democrats in battleground districts have received more than $30,000 from Rep. Jimmy Gomez (D-CA), who faces allegations of sexual misconduct from a female staffer, over the last several election cycles. None of the Democrats…
Jeet Heer Democrats need a fighter, but the congressional leader is addicted to illusory comity. The post How Jared Kushner Snookered Hakeem Jeffries appeared first on The Nation .
House Democrats huddled Wednesday morning to weigh potential changes to internal party rules after a pair of centrist lawmakers crossed the aisle a day earlier to help Republican leaders advance a series of GOP messaging bills that were on track to fail. The defections by Democratic Reps. Jared Golden (Maine) and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez…
Plus: 🎵 Dollyfest is coming in 2027! {beacon} It’s Wednesday. We have officially entered the late 2020s.
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front.