Donovan Slack

USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi officially has competition for the Democratic leadership slot.

Rep. Tim Ryan, D-Ohio, announced Thursday that he would challenge Pelosi, who has led House Democrats since 2003.

“I have spent countless hours meeting and talking to Members of our Caucus, and the consensus is clear. What we are doing right now is not working,” he wrote in a letter to colleagues.

Pelosi earlier this week delayed party leadership elections until Nov. 30 amid the tumult following last week’s Democratic losses. Her office did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment. When speaking to reporters earlier Thursday, she seemed extremely confident that she would retain her leadership post.

“Without even asking anybody for a vote, I have over 2/3 of the caucus supporting me,” Pelosi said.

She characterized current divisions within Democrats as family arguments and said she is “respectful of what people are saying.”

“I’ve regularly had some opponents, and as members said, we cannot be taking full responsibility for what happened in the election,” Pelosi said. “We have to do our after-action review thoroughly and see what we could have done differently, but a lot of it was beyond our control.”

Ryan, a 43-year-old from the Youngstown area, would represent a sharp contrast with Pelosi’s California liberalism. He is a moderate Midwesterner who has railed against free trade, been centrist on guns, and was anti-abortion until last year, when he switched his position.

He has been in Congress since 2003, serves on the powerful budget and appropriations committees, and is co-chairman of the Congressional Manufacturing Caucus. In his letter, Ryan noted Democrats have only held a majority in the House of Representatives for four of the last 20 years, “and last week’s election results set us back even further.

“We have lost over 60 seats since 2010,” he said. “We have the fewest Democrats in state and federal offices since Reconstruction. At this time of fear and disillusionment, we owe it to our constituencies to listen and bring a new voice into leadership.”

Ryan argued that everyone in the party should reevaluate their roles, not only in the House Democratic caucus, but in the Democratic Party and the nation.

“The American people need to know we understand that they elected us to fight for economic opportunity for all,” he said. “We need to create America 2.0 — a multicultural, progressive, and innovative country that fights every day for ordinary people.”

He told USA TODAY earlier this week that other Democrats approached him and asked him to consider a run against Pelosi, a prodigious fundraiser whom Ryan praised and who helped Democrats win a House majority and became the first female speaker of the house a decade ago.

But Ryan said Democrats need to have "rough family conversations," about reconnecting with blue-collar workers. "When you lose those working-class people...then you can't have a national party," he said.

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