Jeffries congratulates Trump, says Democrats are not party of ‘election denial’

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), a fierce critic of President-elect Trump, congratulated him Thursday, emphasizing that Democrats respect the will of the voters and won’t challenge the results.

“The American people have spoken,” Jeffries said in a statement. “I congratulate President-elect Donald J. Trump.”

The brief statement, issued two days after Trump and the Republicans routed Democrats at the polls, did not mention the 2020 election or the GOP’s efforts to deny President Biden’s victory and keep Trump in office that cycle. 

But Jeffries’s emphasis on accepting election outcomes, even in defeat, was a clear shot at Trump and some of his allies in Congress for their refusal, even today, to assert that Trump lost the contest four years ago. 

“I am proud that the Democratic Party does not believe in election denial,” Jeffries said. “Our Democracy is precious and it involves elevating public trust in our system of free and fair elections, not undermining it.” 

On Capitol Hill, the GOP effort to overturn the 2020 results was led by Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.), a former constitutional lawyer, who drafted the legal rationale for challenging Trump’s defeat that year in a handful of battleground states. Johnson is now the House Speaker, and this week’s message from Jeffries — who’s in line for the gavel in the long-shot event that Democrats flip control of the House next year — was clearly intended to contrast the Democrats’ acceptance of election results, even after a loss, with the refusal of top Republicans to do the same.  

“We cannot love America only when we win,” Jeffries said. 

Jeffries is among the loudest Trump critics on Capitol Hill. He was one of the seven House Democrats who managed Trump’s first impeachment in 2019. And since the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, he’s repeatedly made clear that he sees Trump and his supporters as a material threat to the nation’s democratic foundations.

Democrats had sought to make democracy and “election denialism” a major issue on the campaign trail this year, the first presidential election following the Jan. 6 attack. But the message did not resonate with most voters, who appeared to accept — or ignore — Trump’s argument that the 2020 contest was “stolen” from him. 

While Trump’s victory over Vice President Harris was a rout, the battle was much closer for control of the House, where both sides collected some wins, and some losses, in the razor-tight race for the gavel. As of Thursday afternoon, the majority Republicans appeared to have the advantage, after picking off a pair of veteran Democrats in Pennsylvania and successfully defending a tough seat in Nebraska that Democrats were confident they’d flip. 

Still, there are a number of close races yet to be called, and Jeffries is holding out hope that Democrats will still prevail by flipping battleground seats in Arizona, California and Oregon that remain up for grabs. 

“It has yet to be decided who will control the House of Representatives in the 119th Congress,” he said. “We must count every vote and wait until the results in Oregon, Arizona and California are clear.” 

The Democrats’ struggles at the polls this week have already triggered a bitter game of internal finger-pointing, with some in the party blaming Harris for how she managed her campaign. 

Jeffries soundly rejected that criticism on Thursday, hailing Harris and her running mate — Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz — as “remarkable public servants who ran an inspired and positive campaign focused on lifting people up.”

“We look forward to our continued partnership on behalf of the American people in the next chapter of their public service journey,” Jeffries said.