The Maryland Democrat spent months exploring a 2028 presidential run and said last week he didn't want the job. Thursday night, he went for it anyway.
BREAKING | By Joseph J. Jackson | WASHINGTON (Nov. 12, 2026)
The short version
Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland will run for Senate majority leader, challenging Chuck Schumer, who has led Senate Democrats since 2017.
Schumer says he already has the votes. Senators decide by secret ballot in early December.
Van Hollen spent months openly exploring a 2028 run for president. He hasn't said whether this ends it.
Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland said Thursday he will run for Senate majority leader, setting up a direct challenge to Chuck Schumer, who has led Senate Democrats since 2017, the Associated Press reported.
Van Hollen made the announcement in an interview with Jen Psaki on MS NOW, days after Democrats won control of the Senate in the midterms. "The American people called for change," he said in a statement. "To deliver, we need new leadership."
Schumer answered fast. "I have the votes to continue serving as Democratic Leader," he said, pointing to "55 seats and counting." Van Hollen puts the number at 56, telling Psaki the win gives Democrats "a mandate." Two Senate races are still uncalled.
The vote is a closed-door, secret ballot among Democratic senators, expected in early December.
The 2028 question
For months, Van Hollen had been "kicking the tires" on a run for president. He went to New Hampshire in June, Maryland Matters reported, and said it again on Meet the Press in August. As recently as Nov. 6, he told Fox 5 DC: "I've made clear that I'm not looking to be the next Democratic leader." He told FOX45 in Baltimore he would decide on 2028 by early next year.
Then progressive groups and incoming senators kept pushing his name. By Monday he was in "listening mode" and said he hadn't shut the door. By Thursday he was in.
He has not said publicly whether running for leader ends his White House plans. Running the Senate and running for president at the same time would be a tall order.
Who's with him
Michigan Senator-elect Abdul El-Sayed endorsed Van Hollen by name and introduced him as the "next Senate majority leader" at a rally this summer. Sen. Bernie Sanders has said he won't support Schumer. Minnesota Senator-elect Peggy Flanagan called for new leadership on election night. The progressive group Indivisible has called on Schumer to step aside.
What he's running on
Van Hollen calls the Iran war "illegal and senseless" and says he would withhold support from the next funding bill, risking a shutdown after Dec. 11, unless President Trump agrees to end it, HuffPost reported. He has also called out Schumer for siding with AIPAC and the crypto industry.
Who he is
Van Hollen, 67, was born in Karachi, Pakistan, to American parents; his father was a U.S. diplomat. He served in the Maryland legislature, then won a U.S. House seat in 2002 by beating Republican Rep. Connie Morella. He chaired House Democrats' campaign arm from 2007 to 2011 and won Barbara Mikulski's Senate seat in 2016.
In 2025 he flew to El Salvador seeking the release of wrongly deported Marylander Kilmar Abrego Garcia and was turned away from the CECOT prison. He has become one of the Senate's sharpest critics of Israel's war in Gaza.
The catch
From 2017 to 2019, Van Hollen ran the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee under Schumer. That's the same campaign machine that TIME says left many senators owing Schumer favors. Van Hollen helped build the operation he now has to beat.
FMNN will update this story as senators pick sides and as Van Hollen addresses 2028.
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Sources
Photo: Sen. Chris Van Hollen, official Senate portrait. U.S. Senate Photographic Studio via Wikimedia Commons, public domain.