I Think David Hogg's Tenure As A DNC Vice Chair Is Likelier To Be Measured In Hours Than In Months

I spent much of this week looking into primaries that pit progressive activists against establishment candidates who have already run and lost more than once, like Randy Villegas, who’s taking on corrupt conservative Rudy Salas in California’s Central Valley, Travis Terrell, who’s taking on out-of-touch establishment figure Christina Bohannon in Iowa’s first district, and one we already endorsed, Emily Berge, the progressive alternative to Blue Dog loser Rebecca Cooke in central and western Wisconsin. We also endorsed Lukas Ventouras in Suffolk County, who will likely have to fight it out with Republican-lite, anti-union loser John Avlon... plus an entirely different category of candidate— Saikat Chakrabarti, who is taking on… wait for it— Nancy Pelosi.

I doubt DNC Vice Chair David Hogg, age 25, is going to lend his name or fame to the race against Pelosi— ironically, his organization appears to have already endorsed Pelosi for reelection— but a NY Times piece this morning reported on how Hogg is working to unseat older lawmakers in primaries. Pelosi will be 86 before the next primary. Shane Goldmacher reported that Hogg’s project “is sure to rankle some fellow Democrats: spending millions of dollars to oust Democratic members of Congress in primary elections next year.” You think? Rankle is probably too mild a word.

Hogg “is planning through a separate organization where he serves as president, Leaders We Deserve, to intervene in primaries in solidly Democratic districts as part of a $20 million effort to elect younger leaders and to encourage a more combative posture against President Trump. In an interview, Hogg said he understood that he would face blowback for his decision to serve simultaneously as a top official in the party— which is typically focused on electing Democrats over Republicans— and as a leader of an effort to oust current Democratic lawmakers. ‘This is going to anger a lot of people,’ Hogg said of his efforts, which he began to brief allies, some lawmakers and party officials on in recent days. He predicted ‘a smear campaign against me’ that would aim to ‘destroy my reputation and try to force me to stop doing this. People say they want change in the Democratic Party, but really they want change so long as it doesn’t potentially endanger their position of power,’ he said. ‘That’s not actually wanting change. That’s selfishness.’ His decision to engage directly in primaries threatens to fracture the leadership of the Democratic National Committee.”

A generational divide has emerged as one of the Democratic Party’s most contentious rifts in the early stages of the Trump administration, as younger officials press their elders to toss aside deference for more confrontation.

“What we are not saying here is, ‘Oh, you’re old, you need to go,’” Hogg said of older officials. “What we’re saying is we need to make room for a new generation to step up and help make sure that we have the people that are most acutely impacted by a lot of the issues that we are legislating on— that are actually going to live to see the consequences of this.”

Hogg said Leaders We Deserve would focus heavily on House races and back primary challengers only in safe Democratic districts, which are not at risk of falling into Republican hands in 2026. The group also plans to spend on contests for state legislatures. He said the central issue was not ideological but rather how capable and active lawmakers were at pushing back on the Trump administration.

“More than anything, it is: Do you want to roll over and die, or do you want to fight?” he said. “And too many people look at our party right now and feel like we want to roll over and die.”

Hogg said he was not yet ready to name any incumbents whom his organization planned to try to unseat. But he stressed that the criteria for challengers to get his group’s backing would not simply be age. Notably, he cited two examples of effective older lawmakers who have drawn primary challengers in 2026 but who he believes deserve re-election: Representative Jan Schakowsky of Illinois, 80, and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California, 85.

“Big announcement soon,” Kevin Lata, the executive director of Leaders We Deserve, teased in an interview of the group’s first endorsements.

Hogg has begun to marshal some support in advance of announcing his plans.

Randi Weingarten, an influential D.N.C. member and the president of the American Federation of Teachers, said she was backing Hogg’s efforts to insert his group into primaries, though she said she did not know yet of any specific members being targeted.

“Yes, it will ruffle some feathers, and yes, some people will be upset,” Weingarten said. “The key is that they are trying to create the connection between the long-term values of the party and people who don’t see it. And you have to do things differently to make that connection.”

…Hogg has drawn heavy attention from conservative media for his activism and some of the left-wing positions he has embraced, including, as he wrote on social media three years ago, that all drugs should be legalized and that no one should have more than $1 billion in assets— and that “there should be a 100 percent tax after your first billion.”

Leaders We Deserve raised nearly $12 million last election cycle, mostly from small contributors, though the organization counted some major donors among its financiers, including the California-based investor Ron Conway, who gave $500,000.

... [W]hile Hogg said the 2026 efforts would not be based on ideology, he did say that some younger challengers were likely to run to “the right” of incumbent Democratic lawmakers— and that those challengers would not garner his group’s support. “That is not who we are looking to support,” he said.

His organization generally supports candidates who are 30 or younger for state legislatures and those who are 35 or younger in federal campaigns.

Sunjay Muralitharan, the national president of College Democrats of America, said he supported Mr. Hogg’s efforts.

“His willingness to challenge the status quo while holding an official role is part of the reason why I believe he’s a good leader for Gen Z,” he said.

I asked a number of party officials and no one wanted to touch this with a ten foot poll, not even off the record! One top Democratic strategist, around the same age as Hogg, though, apparently not a fan, lashed out. “He’s an attention seeker who cares about the things he professes to care about as much as Trump cares about the office of congressional ethics. He will be out the minute someone buys him off.”

And just moments ago, a member of Congress did let loose too— and not an especially elderly one. “Here is my honest opinion,” he told me. “It usually isn’t taken as a qualification for political office that one was born yesterday. This is just a stupid extension of identity politics. Is he tackling social inequality? No. Is he attacking poor health care? No. Is he even promoting gun safety, which he has claimed that he cares about? No. He’s just attacking old people on the basis that they are old. That is clearly stupid. In fact, it’s juvenile— something stupid that a younger person does because he or she is too young and inexperienced to know any better. And the sheer vanity of it! Tom Brokaw’s generation picked up rifles and did their best to avoid being killed by Nazi’s, while they were saving the country. That’s valid. Our generation survived Kent State and Jackson State and the miserable War in Vietnam, while unfurling banners that said ‘They Can’t Kill Us All.’ That’s valid. What the fuck has Hogg done, other than not getting shot in a schoolyard one day? What decisions did he make that reflect good judgment, or empathy, or leadership? Zero. This is what the Republicans want– in-fighting among Democrats over irrelevant nonsense.”