Nia-Malika Henderson, Columnist

Democrats Face Five Key Leadership Contests in 2025

Will the defeated party choose youth or age? Progressivism or centrism? Change or more of the same?

January 3, 2025 at 11:30 AM UTC

Nia-Malika Henderson is a politics and policy columnist for Bloomberg Opinion. A former senior political reporter for CNN and the Washington Post, she has covered politics and campaigns for almost two decades.

One to watch in 2025.
Photographer: Samuel Corum/Getty Images

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Republicans routed Democrats in the 2024 election. The coming year offers a chance for the defeated party to figure out if the last cycle was a realignment or an electoral anomaly. There has been lots of soul-searching and finger-pointing in recent weeks; that will continue for months as Democrats sort through the results and test theories about how to win in this environment.

We can get a sense of where the party is moving by watching five key leadership contests in 2025: