Will Open-Borders Leader Zoe Lofgren Be the Next Chairwoman of the House Judiciary Committee?

By David North on June 15, 2022

Rep. Zoe Lofgren’s (D-Calif.) star turn in the January 6 House hearings on June 13 raises the question: Will she be the next chairwoman of the House Judiciary Committee? She is one of the most pro-open-borders members of the House and was an immigration lawyer before being elected to a seat in California’s Bay Area. She is the second-most-senior Democrat on the committee and chairwoman of the committee's Subcommittee on Immigration and Citizenship.

But her becoming the chairwoman is both possible and unlikely.

There are three independent variables in this question, and she would have to prevail in all three to get the chair:

  1. She would have to be re-elected in November, which is highly likely.
  2. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), the current chairman, would have to leave the House between now and January, which is possible. Thanks to an adverse re-districting, he is locked in a primary fight with another liberal senior member, Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.), which he may not survive; whoever gets the nomination wins in this deep blue area. Once one of the most obese members of the House, he also needs to stay well.
  3. The House would need to stay Democratic, which appears unlikely.

Nadler’s current district includes Ellis Island.

In the old days, Tammany Hall would have stepped in on behalf of one of the two sitting members and would have found a judgeship or some other patronage position for the other; but Tammany has not elected a member of the national House in more than a quarter-century. Both Maloney and Nadler came up in the ranks of the reform movement.

Topics: Politics