Jon Stewart Dumps Cold Water on Schumer and Jeffries as Successful Leaders If Dems Win Congress: ‘I Am Not Confident’

Jon Stewart is “not confident” that the Democratic Party’s current leadership can be effective or much more than reactionary to President Donald Trump should Democrats take a majority in Congress in the midterms.

On the latest episode of The Weekly Show that dropped on Wednesday, Stewart wrapped up in his usual fashion by taking questions from listeners. One asked if the “downside” to Democrats winning control of Congress would be that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) would “get more airtime.”

After busting out an impression of Schumer, Stewart then called on Democratic leaders to sell themselves on policy, rather than simply being anti-Trump.

“I think what’s going to happen is they’re going to have to f*cking do something. They’re going to have to deliver. They’re not going to able — it will not be sufficient to make their entire personalities opposition to whatever Trump politics are,” Stewart said.

Being “opposition” to Trump, he argued, will not be enough for voters. He added that he doesn’t believe Schumer and Jeffries have it in their “DNA” to be the effective leaders the party would need.

“They are going to have to have a prescription for rebalancing this economy in a smart and urgent way, and I am not confident that is in their DNA. I’m not confident it’s in Schumer’s DNA, certainly, which means I’m actually hopeful that he won’t be there as the leader,” Stewart said.

He added that he wants a Democratic Party “not bound by some idealized vision of what the parliamentarian might think is okay.”

“F*ck that. If you are granted control, if they give you the ring, do something with it, you b*stards,” Stewart said.

The Daily Show host has taken issue with Schumer in the past — once busting out a pair of low-hanging glasses to mock him, a gag he repeated in the latest Weekly Show episode.

“I don’t understand the idea of Schumer to begin with,” he previously said about the senator. “His passivity in the face of these really kind of existential crises that occur is beyond me and even the subtle adjustments that he makes, given the frustration of the Democratic constituency writ large, is ‘I’ll curse me.’ Even that is all show and it’s frustrating.”

Watch above via The Weekly Show.

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