With Democrats now in the majority in the House, five committee chairs will wield considerable power to investigate the president

The midterm elections brought an end to a period of one-party rule in Washington. In January, Donald Trump will face a newly empowered House Democratic majority eager to take him on.

The incoming Democratic committee chairs have vowed rigorous oversight of Trump and his administration. Armed with committee gavels, they will now have the power and resources to pursue investigations, issue subpoenas and compel testimony.

Trump in response has threatened to adopt a “warlike” posture, signaling a tumultuous end to an already-volatile first term.

Here are the men and women most likely to torment the president.

Elijah Cummings

Incoming chair of the House committee on oversight and government reform

As the ranking Democrat on the committee, Cummings has sat through his share of Republican-led investigations into the Obama administration. Now the outspoken 67-year-old will wield one of the most powerful gavels in Washington.

The son of two former sharecroppers who moved from the south, Cummings was born and raised in Baltimore, a city he now represents in Congress. He practiced law and served for 14 years in the Maryland house of delegates before being elected to Congress in 1996.

In January, Cummings will become one of the Democrats’ chief investigators into the Trump administration.

He describes his approach as having “two tracks”. One track will scrutinize the executive branch, including whether Trump has profited from the presidency; a decision to add a citizenship question to the US census; and hush payments made to women with whom Trump allegedly had affairs. A second track will focus on reforms such as overhauling the US postal service and lowering prescription drug prices.

Cummings has been wary of calls to impeach Trump. Rather than issuing subpoenas “like somebody’s handing out candy on Halloween”, the Democrat says he prefers a more judicious approach.

“I’m not looking for retribution,” Cummings told ABC News. “Life is too short.”

Adam Schiff

Incoming chair of the House permanent select committee on intelligence

Schiff is one of Trump’s most combative political opponents.

Mocked by the president as “Liddle Adam Schiff” – a barb that was recently modified to “Little Adam Schitt” – the California Democrat was at the center of the House’s deeply partisan investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.

Schiff began his career as a prosecutor with the Los Angeles division of the US attorney’s office in 1987. He gained prominence by prosecuting a case against the first FBI agent to be indicted for espionage against the United States. (The agent was convicted of passing classified information to the Soviet Union for money.) He was elected to Congress in 2000 after serving in the California state senate.

Schiff, 58, is a leading attack dog on the Russia investigation and obstruction of justice.

The Democrat has said he will examine whether Russia has financial leverage over the president through its investments in Trump’s business empire, something Trump says would “cross a red line”.

Schiff recently said: “If the president’s business is trying to curry favor with the Kremlin, we can’t ignore that.”

The congressman has also signaled that he will seek more information about whether Trump sought to obstruct the FBI’s investigation into the president’s dealings with Moscow when he fired its director James Comey. He also hasn’t ruled out calling Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr, to testify in a public hearing.

Jerrold Nadler

Incoming chair of the House judiciary committee

The New York Democrat, universally known as “Jerry”, will chair the House judiciary committee, which has jurisdiction over key policy areas but will be watched closely for its role in any impeachment proceedings.

Nadler’s political career began in 1977 as a New York assemblyman while he was still attending Fordham Law School. He was elected to Congress in 1992, and represents Manhattan’s Upper West Side, Wall Street and parts of Brooklyn.

Long before Trump came to Washington, he and Nadler sparred over a real estate venture proposed by Trump that Nadler forcefully opposed. In his book The America We Deserve, Trump later described Nadler as “one of the most egregious hacks in contemporary politics”.

Known as a steady hand, Nadler had been careful about broaching the topic of impeachment, dismissing such discussions as “premature”. However, in December Nadler said court filings stating that Trump directed Cohen to pay hush money “would be impeachable offenses”.

Nadler, 71, has outlined an expansive list of subjects his committee will scrutinize, including Russian interference in the 2016 election; the policy on separating immigrant families at the southern border; the justice department’s failure to defend the Affordable Care Act; the allegations of sexual misconduct and perjury by the supreme court justice Brett Kavanaugh; a rise in antisemitic and hate crime incidents since Trump’s election, and the appointment of acting US attorney general Matthew Whitaker after the forced resignation of Jeff Sessions.

Maxine Waters

Incoming chair of the House financial services committee

Waters, or “Auntie Maxine” as she is affectionately known by her supporters in the anti-Trump “resistance” movement, is a frequent target of the president.

Insulted by Trump as “crazy” and an “extraordinarily low IQ person”, the 80-year-old Democrat from California has earned her hard-charging reputation by fighting fire with fire. She has called Trump an “immoral, indecent, & inhumane thug” who “loves Putin” and “genuflects for Kim Jong-un”.

The verbal volleys may only get worse as she assumes the top spot on the House financial services committee next year.

Waters has consistently demanded information about Trump’s private bank dealings and possible connections to Russia. As chairwoman, she will have the power to demand answers from Trump’s biggest lender, Deutsche Bank.

She could also increase scrutiny on the nation’s biggest banks and Wall Street. Waters has called for more regulation of banks and could use her power to slow efforts by the Trump administration to roll back regulations on the financial institutions.

Waters was one of the first Democrats in Washington to call for the president’s impeachment.

She will be the first woman to chair the financial services committee.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Photograph: J Scott Applewhite/AP

Richard Neal

Incoming chair of the House ways and means committee

As chairman of the powerful tax-writing committee, the long-serving Massachusetts Democrat is preparing to lead the fight for the release of Trump’s tax returns.

Neal told the Washington Post that he will start by requesting Trump voluntarily release his tax returns.

In the likely event Trump does not acquiesce, Neal, 69, says he will file a legal request with the treasury department to release the returns to a select group of lawmakers on Capitol Hill. Neal expects the effort will ultimately end up in federal court.

Neal will also use his perch to defend social security, Medicare and Medicaid, federal programs that have personal resonance with him. His parents died when he was young, and Neal and his sisters relied on social security survivor benefit checks.

He was elected to Congress in 1988 after serving as a city councilor and mayor of Springfield. He became the ranking Democrat on the committee in 2016.

An outspoken opponent of the Republican tax overhaul, Neal has said he also plans to convene hearings on tax policy as well as healthcare and trade.