Former Democratic House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer to announce retirement after more than 40 years in Congress
Representative Steny Hoyer, a Democrat from Maryland and ranking member of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government, during a hearing in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, May 15, 2025. (Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., the former No. 2 Democrat in the chamber who has served for decades, is set to announce his retirement from Congress, his office confirmed to ABC News.
Hoyer will formally announce his decision not to run for reelection on the House floor at 10 a.m. Thursday.
Hoyer, 86, spent two decades as Nancy Pelosi’s deputy and is set to retire as the California Democrat also prepares to leave Congress at the end of the year — amid a debate in the party about turning over leadership to a new generation.
Their relationship dates back to the 1960s when they served as congressional interns together, decades before they competed to lead Democrats.
The genteel dean of the Maryland delegation, who helped send billions of federal dollars to his state as an appropriator, was often a key negotiating partner for Republican leaders who maintained better relations with him than the hard-charging Pelosi.
Many Democrats are now turning to see if 85-year-old Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, the longtime No. 3 Democrat on the team, will follow through on plans to run for reelection next year.
Low-cost Unmanned Combat Attack System (LUCAS) drones are positioned on the tarmac at a base in the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) operating area, Nov. 23, 2025. U.S. Central Command Public Affairs
(WASHINGTON) — The U.S. military has deployed its first squadron of one-way attack drones to the Middle East, employing a U.S.-built drone that was reverse-engineered from Iran’s Shahed drones that have been used by Iran against Israel and by Russia against Ukraine.
U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) announced on Wednesday the establishment of Task Force Scorpion Strike (TFSS) that will oversee the first of its kind operational deployment by the U.S. military.
The employment of the new one-way drones is an indication of how low-cost drone technology has changed the battlefield in the wake of the war in Ukraine and the war between Israel and Iran.
A common thread in both those conflicts is Iran’s one-way Shahed drones, capable of carrying explosives over long distances. Used by Iran to target Israel, Russia has purchased large quantities of them to launch large swarm attacks against Ukraine.
The Low-cost Unmanned Combat Attack System (LUCAS) drones, built by SpektreWorks, that CENTCOM has deployed to the Middle East are based off the reverse engineering of a delta-winged Shahed-136 drone obtained by the U.S. several years ago, according to a Department of Defense official.
At a cost of $35,000 each, the drones are an improvement on the Iranian drone and a more effective military option at a much lower price point than the deployment of manned fighter aircraft, the official said.
Able to travel long distances, the LUCAS drone is also designed to operate autonomously and can be launched from catapults, rocket-assisted takeoff, and mobile ground and vehicle systems.
The new drones will be sent to various locations in the Middle East, said the official, who declined to provide information as to how many of the drones were being deployed to the region.
Interestingly, the drone squadron does not belong to one of the military services but will be operated by a joint special operation unit operating under CENTCOM.
“This new task force sets the conditions for using innovation as a deterrent,” said Adm. Brad Cooper, CENTCOM commander. “Equipping our skilled warfighters faster with cutting-edge drone capabilities showcases U.S. military innovation and strength, which deters bad actors.”
Israel’s attack on Iran in November severely disabled Iran’s sophisticated missile air defense systems, making it much less able to counter against any air threats, including one-way drone attack, the official said.
“We are essentially flipping the script” on Iran said the official, who noted that the new drone system is a more effective deterrent because there is less risk about its potential use as an offensive capability than if manned aircraft were to be used.
The system’s deployment was spurred in part by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s “drone dominance” initiative that accelerates the delivery of low-cost and effective drones to U.S. forces.
(WASHINGTON) — Speaker Mike Johnson dismissed the possibility he could change his strategy to end the government shutdown by negotiating legislative changes with Democrats, telling reporters on Tuesday that he doesn’t “have any strategy” to end the impasse in place of the GOP’s lackluster pressure campaign to pass a “clean” continuing resolution.
Johnson on Tuesday pushed Democrats to support the House-passed funding bill and slammed the Democrats’ $1.5 trillion proposal, which extends health care subsidies under the Affordable Care Act and reverses cuts to Medicaid.
Asked whether he may consider a different negotiation track as the pressure campaign against Democrats has so far failed to break the standoff, Johnson reiterated that the House-passed bill is a “clean” continuing resolution — free from legislative gimmicks or political games.
“Why don’t I change my strategy? I don’t have any strategy,” the speaker told reporters. “I’m doing the right thing, the clearly obvious thing, the traditional thing.”
The Senate is set to vote Tuesday night — its eighth time — on the GOP-backed “clean” continuing resolution that would fund the government. It’s expected to fail again as the shutdown enters its third workweek.
Congressional Democrats representing Maryland and Virginia — where a significant number of federal workers reside — criticized Republicans over the shutdown on Tuesday morning and supported the workers.
“What we have seen happen to our federal employees we will continues to speak out against,” Sen. Angela Alsobrooks, a Maryland Democrat, said. “We want them to know we appreciate them, we appreciate your service to our country, we still need you, we still need what you offer our country and we will continue to work until you can be able to offer it.”
Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland said President Donald Trump and Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought are “viscously” attacking federal employees.
OMB is working on ways to get paychecks to federal law-enforcement officers amid the ongoing shutdown, according to an OMB official. This comes after recent moves to pay members of the military and fund the critical Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children program.
Trump said he’s directing Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to use “all available funds” to pay members of the military on Wednesday, Oct. 15 despite the shutdown.
The Pentagon said Tuesday that it will use $8 billion found in research, development and testing funds to cover paychecks for the troops on Wednesday.
The move won the approval of Speaker Johnson.
“Look, my understanding of this is they have every right to move the funds around, duly appropriated dollars from Congress to the Department of Defense,” Johnson said Tuesday. “If the Democrats want to go to court and challenge troops being paid, bring it. OK?”
OMB said on its X account on Tuesday that the Trump administration is “making every preparation” to ride out the government shutdown without caving to Democrats’ demands. The agency said they’d continue cutting the federal workforce in the meantime.
“Pay the troops, pay law enforcement, continue the RIFs, and wait,” the post said.
Lawmakers are still in a stalemate with negotiations at a standstill.
“We’re barreling toward one of the longest shutdowns in American history,” Johnson said on Monday.
The record is 35 days and that was set in Trump’s first term.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said during an MSNBC interview Monday that he does not believe the American people will allow the federal government shutdown to proceed much longer because they’ll pressure Republicans to negotiate with Democrats.
Jeffries said Republicans remain unwilling to negotiate over health care as the shutdown continues.
because they’d rather keep the government shut down than deal with the cost-of-living crisis that exists in the United States of America,” Jeffries said.
US Capitol Building (Photo by Mike Kline (notkalvin)/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — Democratic Sens. Martin Heinrich and Mark Kelly will introduce legislation in the Senate on Tuesday that would strip out a provision in the just-passed government funding bill that allows senators to sue the government if their phone records are investigated without notifying them.
The bill comes after Senate Republicans included within the massive government funding bill that ended the 43-day government shutdown a provision that would allow senators whose phone records were subpoenaed by Special Counsel Jack Smith as part of his investigation into the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol to sue for $500,000 per accessed device.
News of the Senate’s inclusion of this provision caused bipartisan outrage in the House of Representatives.
House Speaker Mike Johnson last week said the House would hold a standalone vote on a provision to strip the language out of the funding bill this week. Due to the bipartisan objection to these provisions, the House bill has a high likelihood of being successfully passed out of the lower chamber.
“I think that was way out of line. I don’t think that was a smart thing … and the House is going to reverse — we are going to repeal that, and I’m going to expect our colleagues in the Senate to do the same thing,” Johnson said at a press conference last week.
Kelly and Heinrich’s bill is not identical to the House provision but the two bills closely resemble one another.
Efforts to repeal the phone record provision face a far more difficult path in the Senate than in the House.
The bill has 24 Democratic co-sponsors but currently no GOP supporters.
Sources told ABC News that Senate Majority Leader John Thune was personally responsible for including the language in the bill. Thune would be the one responsible for placing the bill on the floor, where it would need 60 votes to advance.
