Exclusive: No. 2 House Democrat to skip Trump’s State of the Union address
House Minority Whip Katherine Clark joined by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries speaks a press conference at the U.S. Capitol, February 4, 2026, in Washington. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — House Minority Whip Katherine Clark told ABC News she will not attend President Donald Trump’s State of the Union address on Tuesday night, making her the highest-ranking House Democrat to skip the event.
“And let me tell you why,” Clark told ABC’s Linsey Davis in an exclusive interview. “What we have seen from this president is a series of lies, of disrespect for the American people. He campaigned that he would lower costs on Day 1, he would keep people safe and secure. And he has done just the opposite.”
“So, I’m going to spend my evening, while he is spewing his misinformation tonight, talking to my constituents about their state of the union and how this administration is impacting them,” Clark said.
Dozens of Democrats, at least 45, are set to skip the State of the Union address. Many instead are opting to take part in a counter-program on the National Mall sponsored by the progressive group MoveOn.
House Speaker Mike Johnson earlier Tuesday criticized Democrats who will be absent, saying it was “shameful that they would boycott an address.”
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries has made the case for members of his caucus to attend without outbursts or to sit it out altogether.
“It’s our expectation that there will be some members who attend and attend in silent defiance, and there will be other members who will choose not to attend. And it’s up to every individual member to make the decision that makes the most sense for their constituents,” Jeffries told reporters on Tuesday afternoon.
Notable guests of Democratic lawmakers include survivors of late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, the business owner who successfully challenged Trump’s global tariffs and individuals affected by the administration’s immigration crackdown in Minneapolis.
Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger will deliver the Democratic response following Trump’s remarks. The two main themes she will focus on are affordability and the chaos the Trump administration has caused at home and abroad, according to Spanberger’s team.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, a Republican from South Dakota, at the US Capitol in Washington, DC, US, on Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2025. Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg via Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — The House could act as soon as Wednesday to move forward with an effort to strip controversial language in the government funding bill that allows senators to sue the government if their phones are investigated without their knowledge.
Meanwhile, but Senate Majority Leader John Thune continued to be noncommittal about what the Senate will do after the House acts.
The provision was inserted at Thune’s request, ABC News learned, into the massive government funding bill that passed Congress and was signed into law last week at Thune’s request.
The House is expected to pass a measure to repeal the provision with bipartisan support Wednesday night.
The majority leader, who has control over what legislation is voted on in the Senate, did not commit to taking any sort of action in the Senate if the House’s effort to remove the language is successful and offered a defense of the provision.
“You have an independent, coequal branch of the government whose members were, through illegal means, having their phone records acquired, spied on if you will, through a weaponized Biden Justice Department. That to me demands some accountability,” Thune said. “And so, I think everybody is focusing on the private right of action, and whatever the number, you know the number that they agreed on. I think the important thing in all of this is, where’s the accountability, and what is the consequence of bad behavior.”
The legislation that was approved as part of the funding bill gives senators the ability to sue the government retroactively for $500,000 per device accessed as part of an investigation. Eight Republican senators had their phone records subpoenaed by special counsel Jack Smith as part of his investigation into Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election and would be eligible to sue under the law.
Many of those eight senators have told ABC News they have no intention of suing under the new rule. Some of those affected, like Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., say they would support the House effort to appeal.
“I think it’s a bad idea. I mean listen, I’m all for accountability. I mean, I had my phone tapped so I’m all for accountability, don’t get me wrong. But I think taking taxpayer money is not the right way to do it. The right way to do it is tough oversight,” Hawley, R-Mo., said Wednesday morning.
But Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., another senator whose records were accessed by Smith, is digging in.
Graham told host Fox News’ Sean Hannity Tuesday night that he intends to sue for “tens of millions of dollars” under the new rule.
“I think this was worse than Watergate, an effort to destroy President Trump, charge him with crimes that are just ridiculous, and come after people like me. I’m not going to put up with this crap any more. I’m going to sue,” Graham said.
“I am going to sue. If you don’t sue, they’ll keep doing it. Don’t run away from this Republicans, fight back,” Graham told Hannity.
Attorneys representing Smith sent a letter to Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley in October seeking to correct what they call “inaccurate” claims that Smith wiretapped or spied on Republican lawmakers as part of his investigation.
ABC News asked Thune Wednesday if he believed it was appropriate for his members to be suing the government for “millions” in taxpayer dollars.
“I don’t think there is anybody that was targeted for whom the money matters. I think it’s more the principle and making sure there’s a remedy in the future,” Thune said.
If the House passes its repeal of the language, Thune ultimately controls whether this bill gets put on the Senate floor.
If he allows it to, it would need 60 votes to pass. It’s unclear at this time whether there would be those votes, but there are several Senate Republicans who have signaled that they would support repealing the language.
A sign is displayed outside of the Robert F. Kennedy U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) building on June, 2025 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Kevin Carter/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — Three Chinese nationals were charged with smuggling Nvidia and HP products to China, according to charges unsealed by the Justice Department on Thursday.
Starting in September of 2023, Hon Ning Ho, Brian Raymond, Cham Li and Jing Chen allegedly exported chips to China.
The Justice Department alleges that the three Chinese nationals and one American were involved in a scheme to ship these chips to third party countries — Thailand and Malaysia — that would then be shipped to China. The men allegedly set up a shell company to purchase these products.
The Commerce Department has banned China from acquiring these chips.
The Justice Department also alleges that the men discussed ways to “evade United States export laws and regulations.”
In exchange for these chips, the men received “kickbacks” for their alleged work.
In total, the men allegedly smuggled hundreds chips to China.
The Rev. Jesse Jackson walks to the front of the “Invading our community with peace” weekly Friday peace walk led by St. Sabina Church in Auburn Gresham, Chicago on June 25, 2021. (Vashon Jordan Jr./Chicago Tribune/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — The Rev. Jesse Jackson, the civil rights leader, Baptist minister and pioneering politician who launched two bids for the U.S. presidency, died on Tuesday morning at the age of 84, his family said in a statement.
“Our father was a servant leader — not only to our family, but to the oppressed, the voiceless, and the overlooked around the world,” the family statement said.
“We shared him with the world, and in return, the world became part of our extended family. His unwavering belief in justice, equality, and love uplifted millions, and we ask you to honor his memory by continuing the fight for the values he lived by,” it added.
Jackson is survived by his wife, Jacqueline Jackson, whom he married in 1962, and six children.
Jackson had weathered a myriad of health issues in recent years. In November 2025, Jackson was hospitalized in Chicago for treatment of complications from progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP), a neurodegenerative condition that he had been managing for a decade, according to a statement from the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, the civil rights organization Jackson founded.
“Reverend Jackson is in stable condition and is breathing without the assistance of machines,” the Jackson family said in a statement a few days after Jackson’s hospitalization, in response to speculation about his condition. “Contrary to specific reports, he is not on life support.”
“The Jackson family extends heartfelt appreciation for the many prayers and kind messages offered during this time,” the statement also said. Jackson was released from the hospital the following week.
A further family update on Jackson’s health came in mid-December 2025, when it released a statement saying that Jackson had been released from an acute-care facility where he had “received additional care” following his hospital release. The statement also said Jackson “has battled several infections consistent with the progression of his PSP diagnosis” for “the last several months.”
In 2017, Jackson announced that he’d been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease. However, the November 2025 announcement said that the PSP diagnosis had been confirmed the previous April.
Jackson also underwent gall bladder surgery in 2021 and was hospitalized later that year after falling while protesting with students at Howard University in Washington, D.C. He also was hospitalized for COVID-19 that August.
Beginning his career as a protégé of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Jackson quickly rose to become one of the nation’s most prominent and influential civil rights leaders. In 1971, he formed the nonprofit Operation PUSH – People United to Save/Serve Humanity – to advocate for social and economic parity for Black Americans.
Jackson ran for president twice, both times as a Democrat, placing third for the party’s nomination in 1984 and second in 1988, marking the most successful presidential runs of any Black candidate prior to Barack Obama’s two decades later.
Following his first campaign, Jackson formed the nonprofit National Rainbow Coalition with the stated purpose of affording minority Americans a greater political voice. In 1996, Jackson merged the groups into Rainbow/PUSH, and served as the head of both until 2023.
Jackson was also elected in 1990 as the shadow delegate for the District of Columbia, serving a single term. In 1999, President Bill Clinton awarded Jackson the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor.
Jesse Louis Jackson was born Oct. 8, 1941 in Greenville, South Carolina, in the segregated South, and grew up poor in a sharecropping family. He was a gifted student and athlete, graduating from high school with offers for a minor league baseball contract and a Big 10 football scholarship.
He opted instead to attend the University of Illinois before transferring to and graduating from North Carolina A&T, a historically Black university. He then began theological studies before going to work full-time with Dr. King and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). He was ordained a Baptist a minister in 1968.
In 1966, 24-year-old Jackson became head of the Chicago Chapter of the nascent Operation Breadbasket, the economic activism arm of the SCLC, and was appointed its national director the following year. He also helped establish the Chicago Freedom Movement to work for open housing and school desegregation.
Jackson participated in many of the civil rights movement’s landmark moments, including the March on Washington in 1963, where King delivered his famous “I Have a Dream” speech, and the Selma to Montgomery marches in Alabama in 1965. He was also with Dr. King when the civil rights leader was fatally shot at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 4, 1968.
Reflecting on Dr. King’s memory almost 50 years later, Jackson said he was inspired by his ability to remain undaunted even in the face of overwhelming challenges.
“He is a frame of reference. His resurrection is powerful,” Jackson said in a 2018 interview with ABC Chicago station WLS.
Speaking of King’s assassination, Jackson added, “All I can remember is some voice saying, ‘One bullet cannot kill a movement.’ We must keep going … If your key player is hurt on the field you cannot forfeit the game, you have to internalize your pain and keep marching and keep moving, and we have to be faithful to his charge 50 years later.”
Three years after King’s murder, Jackson left the SCLC and founded Operation PUSH, a social justice organization dedicated to improving the economic conditions of Black communities across the U.S.
The organization fought for greater educational and employment opportunities for Black Americans and was successful in compelling major corporations to adopt affirmative action policies benefiting Black workers.
Jackson’s social activism evolved into political ambition in in the 1980s, when he launched two campaigns for the Democratic presidential nomination, in 1984 and 1988. He placed third in primary voting in 1984 and came in second to Democratic nominee Michael Dukakis in 1988, winning 12 primaries and caucuses and receiving some 6.9 million total votes.
As only the second Black American to mount a nationwide presidential campaign, after New York Rep. Shirley Chisholm in 1972, Jackson’s historic runs were the most successful by a Black candidate until President Barack Obama won in 2008.
Jackson ultimately did win political office, when he was elected to serve in the U.S. Senate as a shadow delegate for the District of Columbia, from 1991 to 1997.
Jackson also used his skills as a negotiator to facilitate the freedom of people held abroad, leading to the release of Navy pilot Robert Goodman in 1984 from captivity in Lebanon after his plane was shot down, as well as three American prisoners of war held by Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic in 1999.
In 2000, President Bill Clinton awarded Jackson a frequent critic of Clinton and his policies – the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor, in recognition of Jackson’s decades of social activism.
“It’s hard to imagine how we could have come as far as we have without the creative power, the keen intellect, the loving heart, and the relentless passion of Jesse Louis Jackson,” Clinton said at the ceremony. “And God isn’t done with him yet.”
Jackson was the recipient of numerous other awards throughout his lifetime, including the NAACP President’s Award and the American Institute for Public Service’s Jefferson Award. In 2021, Jackson received France’s highest order of merit, the Commander of the Legion of Honor.
In later years, Jackson was a vocal proponent for the reauthorization of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. He was also involved in the United Kingdom’s Operation Black Vote to promote minority participation in British elections.
In July 2023, Jackson stepped down as head of the Rainbow PUSH Coalition after more than 50 years as its head. “We’re resigning, we’re not retiring,” Jackson said at the time, vowing to continue fighting for social justice causes.
