This article was republished with permission from WTOP’s news partners at Maryland Matters. Sign up for Maryland Matters’ free email subscription today.
Whenever Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-5th) walks into a room, he’s usually greeted with hugs, handshakes, kisses on the cheek and gratitude for his more than 40 years in Congress.
But one longtime colleague stood out when she offered those same accolades Friday during the congressman’s 23rd annual Women’s Equality Day Luncheon in College Park attended by a few hundred people.
“Thank all of you for being here and supporting Steny Hoyer over the years,” said former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, (D-Calif.), who served as keynote speaker at the event. “When I talk about things that relate to women in the world … [and] having fairness in our society, we can be sure that Steny will be on the forefront.”
Without mentioning President Donald Trump (R) and other Republican leaders by name, Pelosi said there’s been efforts to restrict the women’s right to choose and to appoint women to leadership positions.
“Know that there’s nothing more wholesome for our country, whether it’s in politics and government, whether it’s in the academic world, whether it’s in the military, nothing is more enhanced than by the increased leadership and participation of women,” Pelosi said. “When women succeed, America succeeds.”
Women’s Equality Day is celebrated Aug. 26, to commemorate the 19th Amendment that granted women the right to vote and was ratified in 1920.
Hoyer has three daughters and two of his three grandchildren and three of his four great grandchildren are females. After the death of his first wife, Judy Pickett Hoyer, he remarried two years ago to Elaine Kamarck.
“I have been blessed with a lot of women in my life,” Hoyer said to some laughs and applause in the audience.
Hoyer, who turned 86 on June 14, and Pelosi, 85, have served in Congress together since the 1980s, but have known each other even longer, briefly working together in the early 1960s for U.S. Sen. Daniel Brewster (D-Md.). So when Hoyer makes an appearance these days, he is inevitably asked whether he plans to seek a to 24th term in Congress next year.
“We’re thinking about it,” Hoyer said in a brief interview after the luncheon. “I’m in this fight. This is a fight that is worth having. What is being done in Washington is making America less fair, [there’s] less investment in our future. I’m very concerned about it.”
But those concerns stop at violence, said Hoyer, reflecting on Wednesday’s shooting death of 31-year-old conservative activist, Charlie Kirk during an event at Utah Valley State University.
“We know that there are people who think violence is an alternative — violence is an alternative that will cause chaos and death and diminish our democracy,” Hoyer said. “We need every one of us [to] reject the use of violence, particularly when it comes to political speech. Our democracy believes that debate resolves our differences, not violence.”
In the wake of Kirk’s death, bomb threats were made Thursday to Maryland Senate President Bill Ferguson (D-Baltimore City), House Speaker Adrienne Jones (D-Baltimore County) and several historically Black colleges and universities. On the same day, the U.S. Naval Academy was locked down after false reports of a gunman on campus led to the accidental shooting of a midshipman. Morgan State University said Friday that it received a bomb threat, that it determined was not credible, but still informed the FBI “out of abundant caution.”
Rep. Sarah Elfreth (D-3rd) — who once. interned for Hoyer — attended Friday’s luncheon and also reflected on the recent events, including a school shooting Wednesday in Colorado.
“I don’t want to keep going down this course, and I just ask everybody to reflect on this moment and the choice that we have here,” said Elfreth, who plans to go forward with an open telephone town hall Monday that was scheduled before the Kirk shooting. “The only way to get through this is to recognize that we all have a part to play in fixing this.
