You voted in public. They vote in private.
The first decision of the new Democratic majority — who leads it — is the one decision its voters are not allowed to see.
The caucus meets behind closed doors.
House Democrats and Senate Democrats each pick their leaders in a private meeting of members only. No press, no public, no transcript.
The vote is a secret ballot.
Under caucus rules, contested leadership elections are decided by secret ballot. A member can tell you one thing at a town hall and do another in the room, and no one will ever know.
Often there is no vote at all.
When no one challenges the incumbent, the leader is re-elected "by acclamation" — a voice vote with no count, no names, no record. That is how Schumer has kept his job.
So the pressure has nowhere to go.
Voters can call, write and show up, but nothing a member does in that room can ever be checked against what they promised.
America already killed the caucus once.
King Caucus
For 24 years, members of Congress chose presidential nominees in a closed room. Americans called it King Caucus. By 1824 it was so discredited that three-quarters of members stayed away. Its nominee lost, and it never met again.
Whose secret is it?
The secret ballot protects the voter from the powerful. In the caucus it protects the powerful from the voter. Every vote a member casts is cast for you. The only one they hide is the one that decides who leads them.
That isn't a secret ballot. It's a secret from you.
Three things. None of them radical.
We ask that all new members of Congress vote on the record. We are not asking members to vote a particular way. We are asking them to vote where their voters can see it.
1. A recorded roll-call vote for every leadership position.
Name by name, published the same day. The Speaker is elected on the House floor by recorded vote; the party's own leader should be chosen the same way.
2. No acclamation.
A contested or uncontested leader still gets a counted vote. "Re-elected by acclamation" is not a result; it is the absence of one.
3. Say it before you walk in.
Every member states publicly, before the caucus meets, whether they support a recorded vote and whom they will support for leader. Silence is an answer, and we will record it as one.
Why this works
Members do not fear the caucus; they fear their primary. A secret ballot protects them from the second by hiding them inside the first. Take away the secrecy and what voters want stops being noise and starts being a record.
Twenty seconds. One call. Then post it.
The vote is this week. Staff tally calls by topic every day. Make yours count twice: call, then say publicly that you called.
Call the Capitol switchboard
(202) 224-3121Ask for your representative, then call back and ask for each of your senators. Don't know who they are? Find your representative · Find your senators.
If they ask for a position on the leaders themselves, say what you think.
Then say you did
Members read their mentions. Post this after you call — tag your member if you know their handle.
Then ask yourself one question: if the voters who delivered this majority could cast a ballot in your caucus, how would they vote?
You already know. They just told you, by the millions.
The leadership vote is a secret ballot. The people who elected you are not asking for a secret.
Who has said where they stand.
Every Democratic member who states a position on a public vote, or on the leaders, gets listed here with a link to the statement. So does every member who stays silent.
Said publicly they support a recorded vote, or named whom they will support.
Responded, but without a position on a public vote.
No public statement. The column that fills itself.