As colleagues wind down their careers, Conn. Rep. Rosa DeLauro is staying put

WASHINGTON — Connecticut Rep. Rosa DeLauro has indisputable liberal credentials. A founding member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and the first executive director of EMILY’s List, she has long championed causes such as paid family leave and raising the minimum wage.

The top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee is also clear-eyed about the limits of power, especially with her party in the minority. But as she navigates the complexities of President Donald Trump’s tumultuous second term, DeLauro’s pragmatic streak has put her at odds with the demands of a restive base in her solidly blue district.

That tension was on display at a roundtable with faith leaders in Hamden, Conn., last week. In the aftermath of two fatal shootings by federal immigration officers in Minnesota, some in the audience denounced DeLauro’s call to overhaul Immigration and Customs Enforcement, pressing instead for the abolishment of the agency altogether.

Democrats don’t have the votes in the Republican-controlled House to pass legislation that would abolish ICE, DeLauro told the crowd. She was among 21 House Democrats who voted last week for a five-bill spending package, along with a continuing resolution to fund the Department of Homeland Security, to end a partial government shutdown. The vote, however, angered progressives who viewed it as a concession to the Trump administration.

“You cannot pass a wish list because no appropriations bill can become law without bipartisan, bicameral support,” she said later in an email. “But I am voting for bills that have good outcomes and that are consistent with my values.”

Those values are rooted in New Haven, where both her parents were politically active back when Democratic machine politics ruled the city.

DeLauro, who will turn 83 next month, was inspired to enter public life after watching John F. Kennedy accept the 1960 Democratic presidential nomination from her college dorm room. After serving as Connecticut Sen. Christopher J. Dodd’s chief of staff, she won her first election in 1990 to represent the state’s 3rd District.

As DeLauro gears up to run for a 19th term, several of the political titans who came of age with her are winding down their careers. Her close friend and fellow Italian American, former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, 85, is retiring after a barrier-breaking tenure that stretched across nearly four decades. Maryland Rep. Steny H. Hoyer, whom DeLauro referred to as her “partner in legislating,” announced earlier this year that he wouldn’t seek a 23rd full term.

Yet DeLauro has largely dodged the calls to step aside that have dogged so many of her fellow octogenarians in the House, although she does face two primary challengers.

“We’re seeing a generational struggle in the Democratic Party, but Rosa has staying power,” said Jonathan Wharton, a political scientist at Southern Connecticut State University in New Haven who has studied Democratic machine politics. “She grew up, like Nancy Pelosi, surrounded by the political machine in urban America.”

With her colorful clothes, violet-streaked hair and a social media presence sprinkled with Gen Z buzzwords, “the ranking rizzler on appropriations” strives to project an air of youthful relevance. “Age is a number,’’ she said in an interview, invoking her mother, Luisa DeLauro, the longest-serving member of New Haven’s Board of Alders, who retired in her late 80s and died at 103.

The Democratic Party has been gripped by a debate over its aging leaders since former President Joe Biden’s disastrous debate performance in 2024 raised questions about his mental acuity. DeLauro, who is about four months younger than Biden, said he should have stepped aside sooner, “but that’s the past.”

Connecticut Sen. Richard Blumenthal said discussions about the age of members of Congress miss a crucial point.

“It happens that Congress is a place where length of service really does matter, and where people exercise more power and responsibility that’s to the benefit of their states and constituencies,” said the Democrat, who will turn 80 on Friday.

Big plans

Should Democrats win control of the House this year, an outcome party leaders are growing increasingly confident of, DeLauro “will be enormously powerful,” Blumenthal said.

And if Rep. Marcy Kaptur loses a difficult race in Ohio this fall, DeLauro would become the longest-serving woman in the House, along with California’s Maxine Waters, assuming both win reelection in November.

DeLauro intends to once again seek the Appropriations gavel after leading the panel from 2021 to 2023, when Biden was in the White House. She ticked off a number of accomplishments, including a temporary increase in the child tax credit as part of a COVID-era stimulus package.

It will be different under Trump. DeLauro’s first priority, she said, is seizing back the power of the purse from an administration that seems intent on undermining Congress’ budgetary authority.

“Republicans are ceding the power of the Congress to the executive,” DeLauro said. “I work with some very seasoned appropriators who understand the situation, and I do think they’re very aware of what’s happening. But at the moment, they are just not going to buck the president.”

Appropriators have attempted to wrestle back some of that authority this fiscal year, passing 11 of the 12 annual measures thus far. That followed a full-year continuing resolution for all 12 bills the year prior as the Appropriations panel empowered the Trump administration to make spending decisions typically left to Congress.

DeLauro has a good relationship with Republicans on the panel. Oklahoma Rep. Tom Cole, the current chairman, told Politico that DeLauro was among his “favorite people in Congress,” and he likened her to an Italian grandmother, which she is.

Nevada Rep. Mark Amodei, a senior GOP appropriator, said he likes and respects DeLauro, even though they rarely agree. “I think she’s a pro,” said Amodei, who announced his retirement last week. “She has strong opinions, but nonetheless, she’s respectful of the appropriations process and those involved in it.”

Should she win the Appropriations gavel, DeLauro said she plans to summon top administration officials, such as Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Education Secretary Linda McMahon, to testify before the committee about the impact of Trump’s policies. “For God’s sake, they’re dismantling public education. How the hell do we stand by and watch that happen?” she said.

Martin Looney, who leads the Connecticut State Senate, came up with DeLauro in New Haven politics and has known her for more than 50 years. DeLauro, the Democrat said, believes government can improve people’s lives and she’s willing to play the long game to achieve her goals.

“To be an effective legislator, it takes time, it takes seniority, it takes building relationships,” said Looney, who was first elected to the state legislature in 1980. “She’s done great work in Congress as an advocate for all of the good and humane causes (benefiting) people who look to government for help.”

DeLauro has grown accustomed to winning reelection by comfortable margins, though her vote percentage has slipped from the high 60s and 70s to the high 50s in recent cycles. The 3rd District, which is centered in liberal New Haven, swings northwest into the redder Naugatuck Valley. “There are edges of this district that are Republican-leaning,” said Wharton, the political science professor. “People tend to forget that.”

This year, DeLauro’s challengers include Republican Christopher Lancia, a Coast Guard veteran from Milford, and two Democrats: Andrew Rice, a molecular biologist and democratic socialist, and civil rights lawyer Damjan DeNoble. Both Democrats took to social media to criticize DeLauro’s stance on ICE, with Rice calling her an “establishment Democrat” and “failed leader” and DeNoble asserting that DeLauro’s position represented a “moral failing.”

DeLauro, who says she takes every election seriously, recalled Rep. Sanford D. Bishop Jr.’s surprise when she told the Georgia Democrat she faced two primary opponents.

“He said, ‘Why are they primarying you?’ I said, ‘Well, they’re primarying me from the left,’’’ DeLauro said. “He started to laugh (and) said, ‘Who would believe that anyone was to your left?’”

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(Aris Folley and Aidan Quigley contributed to this report.)

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