Reports: Election Denier Hakeem Jeffries to Appoint Suzan DelBene to Democrat Campaign Chief

Election denier and incoming House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) will likely appoint Rep. Suzan DelBene (D-WA) to lead the Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee as campaign chief, multiple reports claim.

Jeffries is likely to appoint DelBene to the position, according to people familiar with the talks who told CNN and Punchbowl. The decision will still need to be approved by the entire House Democrat caucus, but this is the first time in numerous campaign cycles that the Democrat leader would pick the campaign chief.

As Breitbart News noted, picking the DCCC chair — who will be in charge of electing more members to her party in 2024 — is one of the election denier’s first significant leadership tests. Last month it was reported that Jeffries was going to potentially pick a lawmaker to run the DCCC that has not publicly announced a candidacy for the top campaign spot since there is nothing in the rules that explicitly requires the House Democrat leadership to pick someone seeking the role.

Two Democrat California lawmakers — Reps. Ami Bera and Tony Cárdenas — publicly wanted the top spot, but the reports noted that the Democrat leadership wanted to “elevate a woman” to the high-profile role. DelBene, along with two other Democrats, pushed for the rule change that would allow the party’s leader to have a more prominent role in picking a campaign chief.

DelBene, who’s been in the House for a decade, was previously chair of the New Democrat Coalition, which was mainly comprised of centrist and vulnerable Democrats.

Punchbowl also explained:

DelBene, 60, has a degree in biology and worked as an immunology researcher. She later received an MBA and served as an executive for several companies. DelBene also did a 12-year stint at Microsoft before running for Congress in 2010 and coming up short. After two years at the Washington State Department of Revenue, DelBene won a special election to succeed Democratic Rep. Jay Inslee when he became governor in 2012. DelBene holds a seat on the prestigious Ways and Means Committee. DelBene’s husband Kurt, a longtime Microsoft executive, works in the Department of Veterans Affairs.

As Breitbart News closely reported, the current outgoing chair of the committee, Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (D-NY), lost his own reelection in November after Republicans took advantage of his weak Democrat district and his promises not to spend any of the DCCC’s money, although he ended up receiving help in the end.

Jacob Bliss is a reporter for Breitbart News. Write to him at jbliss@breitbart.com or follow him on Twitter @JacobMBliss.