Given the frequency with which Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has been described as a Democratic “rising star” since her 2018 election to the House, it’s worth asking: When, exactly, will Democrats actually let her star rise?
The 35-year-old New York progressive Tuesday lost her bid to head up the Oversight Committee, a panel that will play a key watchdog role over Donald Trump and his incoming administration. Winning out for the post was Gerry Connolly, the 74-year-old Virginia congressman who just last month announced that he was being treated for esophageal cancer. Ocasio-Cortez ran on a message of generational change, the appetite for which has greatly increased since the party’s crushing losses in last month’s election. But Connolly had some powerful old-guard allies in his corner—including former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, 84, who made calls on his behalf. Connolly reportedly carried the vote 131-84.
Some of the opposition to Ocasio-Cortez seems to have stemmed from concern about her more progressive politics, as well as her previous support for primary challenges to incumbent Democrats. But “there was also a sense,” Politico reported, citing eight Democratic lawmakers, “that it was Connolly’s turn, after he had previously run for the Oversight spot twice and served on the panel for 15 years.” Democrats appear to have picked Connolly—at least in part—because they felt he was entitled to the influential post, as a reward for his loyalty and longevity. “He’s been the ranking member-in-waiting,” Democratic Representative Emanuel Cleaver, 80, told Axios.
That sentiment is as telling as it is infuriating. It’s emblematic not only of the party’s gerontocracy but of its tendency to treat powerful positions as a kind of renumeration for loyalty, longevity, and legacy—often at the expense of the party’s best interests. During Barack Obama’s second term, amid suggestions liberal justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg should retire with a Democrat in office, the late California Senator Dianne Feinstein defended her: “She is certainly entitled to serve,” Feinstein told Politico in 2014. Ginsburg would die in office six years later, at 87, allowing Trump to install a third conservative on the Supreme Court—establishing a six-member majority that would fell Roe and erode the liberal principles she championed.
By then, Feinstein herself was the subject of concerning reports about her cognitive and physical decline, which were underscored by her performance in the confirmation hearings of Amy Coney Barrett, Ginsburg’s successor. While she relinquished her leading post on the Senate Judiciary Committee, she remained in office—even as it became clear she was no longer capable of executing her duties. But Pelosi pushed back on calls for Feinstein to resign during an extended medical absence last year: “I’ve seen up close and firsthand her great leadership for our country, but especially for our state of California,” Pelosi told reporters in April 2023, suggesting Feinstein’s critics were sexist. “She deserves the respect to get well and be back on duty.” Feinstein died five months later, at age 90. That wouldn’t carry the same political consequences as Ginsburg’s death; California Governor Gavin Newsom appointed fellow Democrat Laphonza Butler to the vacant seat, allowing the party to keep its majority in the upper chamber. But there would be major fallout the next time Democrats put deference to one of their elder dignitaries over the party’s future.
Joe Biden—who ran and won in 2020 as a transitional figure—was 80 when he announced he was seeking reelection. There were already significant concerns about his age and unpopularity when he kicked off his campaign in 2023. But they were nothing compared with the groundswell he faced after his faltering debate performance this summer. As calls for him to step aside mounted, he insisted, “No one’s pushing me out. I’m not leaving.” Some Democrats rallied around him, framing their support for his flagging candidacy in personal terms: “Joe Biden’s had our back,” Newsom told CNN. “Now it’s time to have his.” Biden would give up his bid, in no small part because of pressure from Pelosi and other leading Democrats. But by the time he passed the torch to then-59-year-old vice president, it may have been too late: Kamala Harris had just 107 days to campaign against Trump, and her run was haunted by her association with Biden and the perception that the administration had sought to hide Biden’s senescence.
Harris’s loss—and the governing trifecta Republicans will enjoy in January—carries a lesson for Democrats about the need for a new generation of leadership, about the inadequacy of the party’s status quo. The ground has begun to shift: Jamie Raskin, currently the top Oversight Democrat, will take over as the ranking member of the powerful Judiciary Committee from Jerrold Nadler; Raskin, at 62, isn’t exactly a “new generation,” except when compared with the 77-year-old Nadler. Meanwhile, Jared Huffman, 60, will succeed 76-year-old Raúl Grijalva as the top Democrat on the Natural Resources Committee.
But AOC’s loss seems to point to a lingering resistance to the new generation among some party elites, who have downplayed concerns about Connolly’s age and health. “Gerry’s a young 74, cancer notwithstanding,” remarked fellow 74-year-old Representative Don Beyer.
Ocasio-Cortez is not entitled to the post by sole virtue of her youth, of course. But the New York representative has distinguished herself on the Oversight Committee, and even some who supported Connolly acknowledged her qualifications after her defeat Tuesday: She is “equipped with all the tools necessary for leadership,” Cleaver told Axios. “Sometimes, it’s a little more time to get there.” But for a party scrambling to curb Trump’s extremist plutocracy, and its own struggles with younger voters ahead of the 2026 midterms, isn’t now as good a time as any?
