Barring Unexpected Election Day Losses, Schumer Looks Undefeatable as Returning Democratic Leader

When Senator Susan Collins went on air this weekend to decry mudslinging in the midterms, it wasn’t just her opponent she accused of lying about her, but the chamber’s top Democrat and a longtime colleague, Senator Chuck Schumer. One of the “outrageous, completely false ads” in this 2026 election cycle included claims that Ms. Collins had ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, an accusation she told a reporter was being repeated in ads attacking two other Republican candidates as “part of Chuck Schumer’s playbook” in his effort to “nationalize” her race.The playbook is well-known. In 2020, Mr. Schumer’s Senate Majority PAC and its affiliates ran ads against Ms. Collins accusing her of corporate greed for her opposition to a stock trading ban — despite her not having traded stocks as a senator. He has also accused her of profiting off the opioid crisis and bringing the U.S. Postal Service to near economic ruin. Ms. Collins is not the sole target of the Democratic leader’s hardball tactics. Mr. Schumer’s Senate Majority PAC has run ads in several campaign cycles seeking to elevate Republican candidates during primary seasons whom Mr. Schumer thought would be weaker nominees against Democrat opponents in the general election.The bank shot is among many of the techniques Mr. Schumer has tried during his 51-year career in politics. Elected to the New York Assembly before turning 25 years of age, Mr. Schumer — who earned his Juris Doctorate and passed the New York state bar, but never took the oath to practice law — served nine terms in the U.S. House before being elected to the Senate in 1998. He spent four years as the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee chairman between 2005 and 2009. His success in the position led the late party chief, Harry Reid, to appoint him to the No. 3 spot in the Democratic Caucus in 2010. He became the Democrats’ head honcho in 2016, shifting with election outcomes between majority and minority leader. But this year presents a new challenge to stay atop the heap. Just last year, Mr. Schumer, 75, a Brooklyn-born native up for reelection in 2028, saw his popularity compared to that of chlamydia and the Ebola virus after he voted to avoid a shutdown by passing a government funding bill that also secured discretionary spending for President Trump. Despite what just six months ago looked like an impending triage for the Democratic Party following a series of public debates over the misdirection of the party, Mr. Schumer is now once again the likely Senate majority leader as pollsters and prediction markets expect Democrats to carry the day on November 3.That is, if the Democratic leader can whip up another caucus vote to keep him in power. Mr. Schumer’s political survival not only will depend on taking back the chamber from the Republicans’ current 53-47 grip but also maintaining the leverage and discipline to lead what promises to be a sharply fractured caucus in a tightly divided Senate.Mr. Schumer’s most severe challenges to shepherding his party back to a majority come in the form of Ms. Collins’s current opponent, Troy Jackson, who became the nominee after a rape allegation saw oysterman Graham Platner drop out of the running. In the weeks since the selection by Maine party insiders to prop up Mr. Jackson, a Bernie Sanders acolyte with a folksy accent, a logging background, and six years as the state’s Senate president, the candidate has vacillated between espousing his progressive credentials and meeting with Beltway consultants intent on making him palatable to the same Maine moderates who have voted in Ms. Collins for five terms.In July, prior to taking Mr. Platner’s spot on the ticket, Mr. Jackson told the New York Times that he would not back Mr. Schumer for the top party spot in the Senate should Democrats regain the majority because the party needs a “new approach.” One week later, after his coronation, Mr. Schumer said the two had a great meeting and are “working together to win the seat.” Time will tell if Mr. Jackson, whose campaign admits to working with Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and its billionaire donors, sticks to his position following a prospective victory. Mr. Schumer is also working his way into the good graces of another hard-left candidate who has called for new Democratic leadership. On Sunday, the senator effectively laid to rest the career of Congresswoman Haley Stevens, whom he endorsed in Michigan’s Senate primary, after she defected and endorsed Republican Mike Rogers over her Democratic primary victor Abdul El-Sayed.“This is a despicable betrayal from Rep. Stevens,” Mr. Schumer wrote in a series of X posts that also blasted “over-the-top false attacks on” Dr. El-Sayed. The right’s claims against Dr. El-Sayed “are evidence of the total bankruptcy of the Republican Party” and “fearmongering” he said, echoing Ms. Collins’ criticism of his own tactics. Mr. Schumer’s Senate Majority PAC donated $10 million to Dr. El-Sayed’s campaign in September, Axios reported. However, Dr. El-Sayed has declined to say if he would support Mr. Schumer as the Democratic leader.The leadership stakes seemed a moot point just a few months ago, when Mr. Schumer was fending off calls for his ouster, including from progressive groups such as MoveOn, and hearing mutterings about a potential primary challenge in 2028 from Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Ms. Ocasio-Cortez has joined Mr. Schumer in backing blue Senate candidates in the midterms, including Dr. El-Sayed, for whom she fundraised in New York last month and donated $1 million from her own war chest while stumping across Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. Were Mr. Schumer to face a challenge for the Democratic top spot, it would not come from Messrs. Jackson or El-Sayed, but a more seasoned lawmaker. Senators Chris Murphy of Connecticut and Brian Schatz of Hawaii have both been named as potential contenders by the digital oddsmaking site, Kalshi, though their chances are listed as slim to defeat Mr. Schumer for the post. Even if Mr. Schumer doesn’t win over the likes of the two most progressive prospective Senator-elects, or another potential progressive freshwoman, Minnesota’s Peggy Flanagan, who has also said she would not back Mr. Schumer, he may still have enough juice to strongarm the rest of his caucus for reinstatement. Messrs. Jackson and El-Sayed may just learn yet from the grandmaster how to negotiate inside the halls of Congress.

Barring Unexpected Election Day Losses, Schumer Looks Undefeatable as Returning Democratic Leader

Barring Unexpected Election Day Losses, Schumer Looks Undefeatable as Returning Democratic Leader

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