The New York Times calls him "The Old Guard," which is accurate enough.
Nadler, Pillar of Democratic Party's Old Guard, Will Retire Next Year
Representative Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat who has been one of Congress's leading liberal voices for three decades, will not seek re-election next year, heeding a call for generational change roiling his party.
The decision will mark the close of a 34-year congressional career that put Mr. Nadler at the center of major civil rights battles and three presidential impeachments. It will also almost certainly touch off a crowded primary fight over a rare open Democratic seat in the heart of Manhattan.
In a recent interview in his downtown Manhattan office, Mr. Nadler, 78, said he hesitated to step aside when he believes that President Trump is threatening the foundations of democracy. But he said he had been persuaded it was time for a changing of the guard.
"Watching the Biden thing really said something about the necessity for generational change in the party, and I think I want to respect that," Mr. Nadler said, adding that a younger successor "can maybe do better, can maybe help us more."
Mr. Nadler, who is both the longest-serving New Yorker and Jewish member of the House, had already been swept up in an intraparty reckoning over aging leaders. He was forced to give up his House Judiciary Committee leadership at the beginning of the term when it became clear a younger, more energetic colleague would beat him. Back home, he was facing a 26-year-old primary challenger.
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Mr. Nadler also declined to name specific colleagues he believed should retire, though he acknowledged that other aging Democrats ought to consider it.
"I'm not saying we should change over the entire party," he said. "But I think a certain amount of change is very helpful, especially when we face the challenge of Trump and his incipient fascism."
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For years, Mr. Nadler's seat snaked down the West Side of Manhattan into Brooklyn, making it the most Jewish district in the country. In 2022, redistricting forced him into a painful primary with a longtime crosstown ally, Representative Carolyn Maloney. Mr. Nadler won in a rout.
Indeed. NY courts redrew NYC's Congressional districts. Jerry Nadler and Carolyn Maloney, two hard-left liberals, were forced to compete in the same primary when their districts were merged. Nader defeated Maloney.
And now he says he's too old to continue serving.
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Mr. Nadler said last week that he was now fearful Mr. Trump was bent on undoing much of what he had fought for in Congress.
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"I am not terribly optimistic. I wish I could be," Mr. Nadler said. "But this is the most severe threat we've had to our system of government since the Civil War, and unfortunately Abraham Lincoln is not the president."
A big impetus for his decision: He's pro-Israel in a party that is now pro-Hamas terrorism and pro-Second-Holocaujst.
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For years, he has tried to stake out space for a politics that was both pro-Israel and progressive. But in the interview, he conceded that Israel's brutal prosecution of the war in Gaza had not only turned Democrats against a former ally "to a very major extent" but made his own position increasingly hard to maintain.
"I don't know what to say at this point," he said. "I can't defend what Israel is doing."
Mr. Nadler has been sharply critical of Hamas, still believes in a two-state solution for the region and does not agree with those who say Israel is carrying out genocide in Gaza. But he said that under the leadership of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel was committing mass murder and war crimes in Gaza "without question."