1. United States
2. N.Y.
3. Letter

I am a Democratic constituent who helped send Democrats to Washington with a mandate. We cannot squander these two years. The party can prove it is serious and has learned from the mistakes that enabled a second Trump term. I am asking my representative for one thing: reject Hakeem Jeffries as Speaker of the House. On Meet the Press, Leader Jeffries, who cosponsored Medicare for All from 2013 to 2021 before dropping it as leader, was asked if he would even put it up for a vote as Speaker. His answer: "It's not legislation that I currently am cosponsoring or that I support." That came the same day a CBS poll found 90 percent of Democratic voters want Medicare for All passed, days after a Yale study found it would save 114,000 lives and $1 trillion a year. It also came after he took $391,000 in healthcare PAC money this cycle, in a deep blue seat with no primary challenge. That is a leader telling his own voters their top priority is off the table before the Congress is sworn in. The voters sent the opposite message. Candidates who ran on Medicare for All won nationwide, including in competitive districts, and others won on a public option. In NBC's exit poll, 90 percent of voters said corruption was a crucial or major factor in their vote. Yet the morning after, Jeffries was on TV saying voters do not want Democrats to "get even." Nobody is asking for revenge. We are asking for accountability: investigations into the blatant corruption this administration has carried out in plain sight. A Speaker already softening on that fight is not the leader this moment demands. As Rep. Ro Khanna said, those who have lost two elections to Trump are no experts on electability. The leadership that brought us here cannot answer this mandate. It is time for a House voice that represents the voters' mandate, with leaders unafraid to investigate Trump and his cronies for the corruption we have all watched. Hakeem Jeffries is not the right choice for Speaker.