Two men from Europe were charged with “swatting” dozens of members of Congress and other high-ranking public officials in what the Justice Department described as a conspiracy that lasted four years.

Thomasz Szabo, 26, of Romania, and Nemanja Radovanovic, 21, of Serbia, were charged with 34 felony counts for allegedly perpetrating the harassment scheme.

Swatting — a practice in which false 911 calls are placed to trigger a massive police presence at a residence or business — has been a widespread problem in recent years for elected representatives, judges and other prominent officials.

Szabo and Radovanovic targeted 61 public officials and 40 private individuals with swatting attempts, the Justice Department said. The public officials include members of the House and Senate, Cabinet-level executive branch officials, senior officials of federal law enforcement agencies, and state officials. The names of the victims have not been released.

The two defendants also made bomb threats against unnamed businesses, religious institutions and a university, the Justice Department said.

The scheme began in December 2020 and continued until January 2024, according to an indictment unveiled Wednesday by federal prosecutors in Washington D.C.

As political polarization has intensified, members of Congress from both parties have reported being targeted by swatting incidents — including on holidays and during family dinners.

Last year, Rep. Brandon Williams (R-N.Y.) disclosed a “swatting” incident on Christmas.

“Our home was swatted this afternoon,” he wrote on X. “Thanks to the Deputies and Troopers who contacted me before arriving.”

Three days later, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) said her two daughters were swatted.

And earlier this year, Rep. Shontel Brown (D-Ohio) denounced swatting after she was targeted.

“It is truly alarming that someone would attempt to harass or intimidate me in this way, while also forcing law enforcement to devote resources unnecessarily,” Brown said. “No one deserves this, and it puts so many people at real risk.”

Former Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.) retired from Congress this year after an anonymous call was placed to law enforcement falsely claiming that Gallagher had been shot and that his wife and two young daughters were held hostage.

“I signed up for the death threats and the late-night swatting, but they did not. And for a young family, I would say this job is really hard,” Gallagher told reporters.

Members of Congress are not the only public figures who have experienced harassment. Judges, prosecutors and others involved in Donald Trump’s legal battles have experienced swatting, death threats, racist insults and other threats.

“Swatting is not a victimless prank — it endangers real people, wastes precious police resources, and inflicts significant emotional trauma,” said Matthew Graves, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, whose office brought the charges against Szabo and Radovanovic.

Nancy Pelosi spent the duration of the Jan. 6 Capitol attack focused on ensuring Joe Biden would be certified president as soon as possible. Then she turned her attention to Donald Trump.

“I just feel sick about what he did to the Capitol and the country today,” Pelosi said as she slumped, visibly exhausted, in the back of her SUV in the pre-dawn hours of Jan. 7. “He’s got to pay a price for that.”

Pelosi’s comment was included in about 50 minutes of unaired footage captured by her daughter, filmmaker Alexandra Pelosi, who was at the former speaker’s side at key moments on Jan. 5, 6 and 7 in 2021. POLITICO has reviewed the footage, which HBO turned over this week to the Republican-led House Committee on Administration.

The panel is conducting an investigation aimed at undermining the findings of the Jan. 6 select committee, which found Trump singularly responsible for the havoc his supporters unleashed on the Capitol, and spotlighting the security failures that exacerbated the violence. The panel has reviewed video from various sources, including security footage and the clips from HBO.

It’s the most detailed glimpse yet of Pelosi’s rushed evacuation from the Capitol, showcasing her deep discomfort at being forced to flee from the rioters — who she feared would see the evacuation as a twisted victory — and her insistence that Congress return to finish certifying the election. It also showed how her focus quickly shifted to impeaching Trump for a second time, an effort that was ultimately successful, as well as preparing to fire Capitol security officials who she believed mismanaged the threats to the building.

The speaker’s evacuation

In the footage, Alexandra Pelosi captured the chaotic moments after the then-speaker was whisked off the House floor by Capitol Police officials and rushed through the byzantine tunnels of the Capitol to her waiting SUV. HBO acknowledged that the 10-minute clip of Nancy Pelosi’s evacuation was redacted to remove stray comments from her minor grandson, who was at her side during the evacuation.

As she moved, Pelosi immediately inquired as to whether then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell had approved a request for the National Guard. Her chief of staff, Terry McCullough, responded that he had. Moments later, a security official at Pelosi’s side informed her the pro-Trump mob had “already breached the Capitol.”

At first, Pelosi scolded security officials for forcing her evacuation. “I did not appreciate this,” she said. “I do not support this.”

“If they stop the proceedings, they will have succeeded in stopping the validation of the presidency of the United States,” she added. Pelosi then lit into Capitol security officials for failing to anticipate the attack.

“How many times did the members ask, ‘Are we prepared? Are we prepared?’ We’re not prepared for the worst,” Pelosi continued. “We’re calling the National Guard, now? It should’ve been here to start out. I just don’t understand it. Why do we empower people this way by not being ready?”

The comments build upon similar remarks Pelosi made that were revealed in a previous batch of her daughter’s footage. That video highlighted congressional leaders’ frantic efforts to facilitate the National Guard’s arrival at the Capitol and their frustration at the hours-long wait while Capitol and D.C. police were being battered by the mob. The new footage builds on that context and provides a more personal look at Pelosi’s decisions during the chaos and in the immediate aftermath.

‘How quick can Trump pardon them?’

As Pelosi huddled with congressional leaders at Fort McNair, waiting for authorities to quell the riot and secure the Capitol, visibly shocked lawmakers offered play-by-play commentary while watching news footage.

“How quick can Trump pardon them?” Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) asked while watching video of the rioters. Nearby, Pelosi, Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer and other House leaders Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) and James Clyburn (D-S.C.) did not offer a response.

Trump did not take any steps in the final two weeks of his presidency to pardon Jan. 6 rioters but has indicated in recent months that he would do so in a second term.

As the leaders began to contemplate returning to the Capitol, they expressed more frustration as Trump released a video statement. In it, the former president praised the rioters, repeated his false claims that the election had been stolen and then urged them to go home.

“We shouldn’t let him off the hook, Nancy. We issued a statement saying he’s got to make a statement. He comes up with this BS,” Schumer said.

“Typical Trump,” Hoyer piped in.

After a beat, Pelosi said: “Insurrection. That’s a crime, and he’s guilty of it.”

Inside Pelosi’s planning

By the morning of Jan. 7, Pelosi’s attention had turned to a forceful statement she planned to deliver at a press conference, declaring Trump a danger to the republic who incited “an armed insurrection against America.”

In a car en route to the Capitol, she spoke by phone to her top aides — including press secretary Drew Hammill, McCullough, senior adviser Jamie Fleet and communications director Henry Connelly — about the content of her statement. The group began to craft her message. When Connelly proposed calling for the resignation of Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund, Pelosi stopped him.

“I think our focus has to be on the president. Let’s not divert ourselves,” Pelosi said, though she added: “I never liked Sund. I think he should’ve been gone a long time ago.”

“The press is very focused on this,” Hammill chimed in, noting that POLITICO had just reported that Schumer was preparing to remove the Senate’s top security official. “Heads are rolling is what we’re saying.”

“I don’t want to have it on a par with the insurrection and impeachment and all of that,” Pelosi replied, saying she would mention it if a reporter asked her about it rather than simply volunteer it.

Pelosi also noted that her statement could not affirmatively say “we will impeach” Trump, because she wasn’t sure all Democrats were on board.

“We don’t have all the Blue Dogs with us on this subject,” Pelosi said, referring to a group of centrist House Democrats.

The Trump campaign and Sund did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The conversation continued in Pelosi’s office in person, surrounded by debris from the riot. A large fireplace mirror had been shattered, serving as the backdrop to the discussion. A pair of pink boxing gloves, given to Pelosi as a gift, were visible on a side table after rioters had manhandled them while ransacking her office.

Pelosi said she had spoken to Sund on Jan. 6 and that “he was throwing his own people under the bus.” As they discussed how sharply to criticize Sund for the Capitol Police’s failures, Pelosi urged aides to “soften” the language, describing a broad “failure of leadership at the top of the Capitol Police.”

The discussion then turned to the fate of the House’s top security official, Sergeant at Arms Paul Irving. The group discussed whether to keep Irving around to manage security for the upcoming inauguration.

“There’s no use keeping somebody around who’s going to blow it, right?” Pelosi said.

McCullough noted that Irving had already privately signaled his plan to retire but that he had stayed on longer at their request to help with the inauguration.

“Only as a favor to us,” McCullough added.

“I don’t care,” Pelosi replied.

“He was going to stay through February, until we found a replacement,” McCullough added.

“But was he just incapable? I mean, he was a Secret Service guy,” Pelosi said.

Fleet volunteered that he had just spoken to Irving, who he said was transparent about the failures that occurred. Irving told him that security officials failed to predict the size of Trump’s crowd — and the effect that Trump’s words would have on them.

Pelosi asked if she could tell reporters that Irving had offered his resignation.

“He hasn’t done that specifically,” Fleet replied. “Want me to call him now and ask him to do that?”

The group agreed, and Fleet left to communicate Pelosi’s wish to Irving, who subsequently did resign his post.

Pelosi wrapped up the conversation by asking for a list of Trump’s Cabinet so she could call them out by name when she urged them to invoke the 25th Amendment and remove the president from office. She also said she intended to describe Trump as “a domestic enemy in the White House.”

“Let’s not mince words about this,” Pelosi said.

Ultimately, she did not identify Cabinet members by name or use the “domestic enemy” line in her statement.

After exiting the meeting, Hammill read Pelosi statements from other national figures who had condemned Trump’s handling of the Jan. 6 attack. When the aide read a quote from former Bush administration Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff — a forceful call for Trump’s resignation or removal — Pelosi paused.

“Good for him,” she said.

Mark Zuckerberg says he regrets that Meta bowed to Biden administration pressure to censor content, saying in a letter that the interference was “wrong” and he plans to push back if it happens again.

Meta’s CEO aired his grievances in a letter Monday to the House Judiciary Committee in response to its investigation into content moderation on online platforms. Zuckerberg detailed how senior administration officials leaned on the company to censor certain posts about Covid-19, including humor and satire, and “expressed a lot of frustration” when the social media platform resisted.

“I believe the government pressure was wrong, and I regret that we were not more outspoken about it,” Zuckerberg wrote. “I feel strongly that we should not compromise our content standards due to pressure from any Administration in either direction — and we’re ready to push back if something like this happens again.”

Zuckerberg also expressed regret for essentially hiding content related to coverage by the New York Post about Hunter Biden ahead of the 2020 election that the FBI warned may have been rooted in a Russian disinformation operation.

“It’s since been made clear that the reporting was not Russian disinformation, and in retrospect, we shouldn’t have demoted the story,” he wrote.

Republicans on the committee, led by Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan, celebrated the letter in a long series of posts on X, calling it a “big win for free speech.”

The White House issued a statement defending the administration’s approach to Covid-19 information.

“When confronted with a deadly pandemic, this Administration encouraged responsible actions to protect public health and safety,” the statement said. “Our position has been clear and consistent: we believe tech companies and other private actors should take into account the effects their actions have on the American people, while making independent choices about the information they present.”

The letter is the latest installment in a multi-year Washington argument about the role of social media companies in suppressing content friendly to conservatives.

Once Elon Musk bought Twitter (now X) in late 2022, turning the platform into a haven for “free speech” and reinstating numerous banned conservative posters, Zuckerberg became a particular target of Jordan.

Like many on the right, Jordan argued that the Biden administration unduly pressured social media platforms to take down content on topics from Covid-19 to Hunter Biden’s laptop.

Jordan demanded extensive internal communications records from Meta and threatened a contempt-of-Congress hearing for the tech mogul before de-escalating at the last minute, saying Meta had provided the documents he requested.

Zuckerberg also said he would not repeat contributions he made in the last presidential election cycle to fund election infrastructure, saying that although they were intended to be nonpartisan, some people still interpreted the effort as benefiting one party or the other.

“My goal is to be neutral and not play a role one way or another — or to even appear to be playing a role,” he said. “So I don’t plan on making a similar contribution this cycle.”

Steve Heuser contributed to this report. 

New Jersey Democratic Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr., the second-oldest member of the House who brought an in-your-face Jersey attitude to the chamber, died Wednesday at age 87.

“It is with deep sadness that we announce that Bill Pascrell Jr., our beloved husband, father, and grandfather, passed away this morning,” Pascrell’s family said in a statement posted on social media. “As our United States Representative, Bill fought to his last breath to return to the job he cherished and to the people he loved. Bill lived his entire life in Paterson and had an unwavering love for the city he grew up in and served. He is now at peace after a lifetime devoted to our great nation America.”

Pascrell had been hospitalized at St. Joseph’s University Medical Center in his hometown of Paterson since July 14. His office said he checked himself in because of a fever but two weeks later said he had a “setback” and needed breathing assistance. He was discharged, but days later his health declined again and he checked into into Cooperman Barnabas Medical Center in Livingston, New Jersey.

It’s the second time this year a sitting New Jersey lawmaker has died in office. In April, Democratic Rep. Donald Payne Jr. died nearly three weeks after having a heart attack. The death of Pascrell also represents another loss of power and seniority for New Jersey in the Capitol after Sen. Bob Menendez, the once-influential chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, was run out of the Senate after being found guilty of corruption.

The 14-term Pascrell was poised to become the oldest House member in 2025, after California Democratic Rep. Grace Napolitano retired. He’d won a primary in June amid backlash to his pro-Israel stance in the Israel-Hamas war and was expected to defeat his Republican opponent in November.

Pascrell was a voluble presence at home in New Jersey or in Washington. Whether it was a press conference to restore a popular tax deduction or making the case to impeach former President Donald Trump, Pascrell could be counted on to deliver an enthusiastic — and usually lengthy — speech.

William James Pascrell Jr. was born on Jan. 25, 1937, and grew up in Paterson, N.J., the city founded by Alexander Hamilton that collapsed into poverty and violence with the end of industrialism. Pascrell, who grew up on the city’s south side, remained there for most of his life.

A baseball enthusiast who said he unsuccessfully tried out for the Phillies, Pascrell played on the Democrats’ congressional baseball team for years and later coached it. In a 2016 interview, he showed a reporter a photo of his youth baseball league and said he would “eat a little dirt before every game to try to scare the other team.” (In 2019, he selected an all-time New Jersey baseball team for the New Jersey Globe, featuring such notables as Yogi Berra, Larry Doby and Sparky Lyle.)

After graduating from Fordham University in 1961, he spent a year in the Army and another five in the Army Reserve. He was a public high school teacher and served as president of the Paterson Board of Education in the late 1970s and early 80s before getting elected to the state Assembly in 1988.

In 1990, while serving in the legislature, Pascrell was elected mayor of Paterson. He spent two terms leading the city before running for the House and defeating incumbent Republican Bill Martini in 1996.

Pascrell has cruised to reelection every two years since then, with few real challenges. He faced perhaps his biggest threat against incumbent Democrat Steve Rothman after redistricting in 2012. The longtime friends and House colleagues waged one of the country’s most contentious intra-party primaries at the time, with Pascrell accusing Rothman of being weak-kneed for challenging him instead of running against a Republican in his newly redrawn district and Rothman questioning Pascrell’s progressive credentials.

Pascrell won in a 22-point blowout.

He enjoyed strong support in the new 9th Congressional District, consisting mostly of towns in Bergen and Passaic counties — areas with significant Jewish and Muslim populations. But after the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks and Israel’s subsequent invasion of Gaza, Pascrell took intense heat from Arab Americans over his steadfast support of Israel.

Mohamed T. Khairullah, New Jersey’s longest-serving Muslim mayor, ran against Pascrell in the June primary because of his resistance to a cease-fire and support for military aid to Israel. Despite the backlash, Pascrell easily defeated Khairullah, capturing 76 percent of the vote, and was strongly favored to defeat Republican Billy Prempeh in the heavily Democratic district in November.

As a member of the House Ways and Means Committee, Pascrell spent years trying to obtain the tax returns of Donald Trump during his presidency. The former president was also a common punching bag for Pascrell, whose social media feed often skewered Trump’s policy record and served up regular reminders that he is a convicted felon. After Joe Biden defeated Trump in November 2020, Pascrell called for “the eventual prosecution” of Trump and “his enablers for their many crimes against the United States.”

One of Pascrell’s other high-profile causes in recent years was ticket prices. He pushed for more than a decade to regulate the live event ticket industry and bring down prices, but his legislation languished.

“A fan shouldn’t have to sell a kidney or mortgage a house to see their favorite performer or team. At long last, it is time to create rules for fair ticketing in this country and my legislation will do exactly that for all the fans,” Pascrell said.

Democrats have until Aug. 29 to select a replacement for Pascrell on the ballot. The decision will be made by Democratic committee members in the 9th District’s towns in Passaic, Bergen and Hudson Counties.

Two high-profile Democrats had made moves to run for Pascrell’s seat in this election but ultimately opted not to: Paterson Mayor André Sayegh and Assemblymember Shavonda Sumter, a Democrat from Paterson. They are both considered potential candidates, along with Assemblymember Benjie Wimberly and others. It remains to be seen whether Bergen County Democrats, whose county has a large share in the district, will field a candidate.

George Santos, who spun lies about his life into an 11-month stint in Congress, pleaded guilty Monday to wire fraud and aggravated identity theft in a case that led to his expulsion from office and the admission that he’d allowed ambition to cloud his judgment.

The former representative, 36, is likely to spend at least six years in prison and owes more than $370,000 in restitution. His guilty plea in federal court on Long Island came weeks before the case was to go to trial. He is to remain free on bond until he is sentenced on Feb. 7.

“I betrayed the trust of my constituents and supporters. I deeply regret my conduct,” the New York Republican said, his voice trembling as he entered the plea.

Santos — elected in 2022 after bandying falsehoods about his wealth and background, including a lie that his mother perished in the 9/11 attacks — told reporters outside court that his political ambitions had led him “to make decisions that were unethical.”

“Pleading guilty is a step I never imagined I’d take, but it is a necessary one because it is the right thing to do,” Santos said. “It’s not only a recognition of my misrepresentation to others, but more profoundly, it is my own recognition of the lies I told myself over these past years.”

U.S. Attorney Breon Peace said that in pleading guilty, Santos had told the truth “after years of telling lies.”

“And that truth is he is a criminal,” Peace said.

Santos was indicted on felony charges that he stole from political donors, used campaign contributions to pay for personal expenses, lied to Congress about his wealth and collected unemployment benefits while actually working.

Peace also said that in addition to the crimes Santos pleaded guilty to, he also admitted to “a litany of other crimes for which the court will hold him accountable at sentencing.”

Among them: admitting that he stole multiple people’s credit card numbers and charged them for his campaign, that he tricked donors into giving money to a bogus nonprofit and used the cash to buy designer clothing, and that he fabricated his personal wealth in a financial disclosure report he submitted to Congress.

Santos was expelled from the U.S. House after an ethics investigation found “overwhelming evidence” he had broken the law and exploited his public position for his own profit.

The case has been set for trial in early September. If that had happened, federal prosecutors said Monday that they were prepared to call some 40 witnesses, including members of Santos’ campaign, employers and family members.

Santos was once touted as a rising political star after he flipped the suburban district that covers the affluent North Shore of Long Island and a slice of the New York City borough of Queens in 2022.

But his life story began unraveling even before he was sworn into office. At the time, reports emerged that he had lied about having a career at top Wall Street firms and a college degree along with other questions surrounding his biography.

New questions then emerged about his campaign funds.

He was first indicted on federal charges in May 2023, but refused to resign from office.

Santos had previously maintained his innocence, though he said in an interview in December that a plea deal with prosecutors was “not off the table.”

Asked if he was afraid of going to prison, he told CBS 2 at the time: “I think everybody should be afraid of going to jail, it’s not a pretty place and uh, I definitely want to work very hard to avoid that as best as possible.”

Separately Monday, in Manhattan federal court, Judge Denise Cote tossed out a lawsuit in which Santos claimed that late-night host Jimmy Kimmel, ABC and Disney committed copyright infringement and unjustly enriched themselves at his expense by using videos he made on the Cameo app for a “Jimmy Kimmel Live” segment. The judge said it was clear that Kimmel used the clips, which were also posted to YouTube, for purposes of criticism and commentary, which is fair use.

Santos had begun selling personalized videos on Cameo in December shortly after his ouster from Congress. He subsequently launched, then quickly abandoned, a longshot bid to return to Congress as an independent earlier this year.

In a radio interview that aired Sunday, Santos said he has taken comfort in being a “somewhat private civilian” again.

“I really don’t miss the rubber chicken dinners and the rah-rah-rah parties and fundraisers,” he said of his former life.

With a criminal trial looming, he had said in the WABC interview that he was “terrified.”

“This is not absolutely an easy process to go through. It really hurts and it really messes with your psychological health,” he told host Cindy Adams.

As the trial date neared in recent weeks, Santos had sought to have a partially anonymous jury, with his lawyers arguing in court papers that “the mere risk of public ridicule could influence the individual jurors ability to decide Santos’ case solely on the facts and law as presented in Court.”

He also wanted potential jurors to fill out a written questionnaire gauging their opinions of him. His lawyers argued the survey was needed because “for all intents and purposes, Santos has already been found guilty in the court of public opinion.”

Judge Joanna Seybert agreed to keep jurors’ identities public but said no to the questionnaire.

Prosecutors, meanwhile, had been seeking to admit as evidence some of the financial falsehoods Santos told during his campaign, including that he’d worked at Citigroup and Goldman Sachs and that he had operated a family-run firm with approximately $80 million in assets.

Two Santos campaign aides previously pleaded guilty to crimes related to the former congressman’s campaign.

His ex-treasurer, Nancy Marks, pleaded guilty in October to a fraud conspiracy charge, implicating Santos in an alleged scheme to embellish his campaign finance reports with a fake loan and fake donors. A lawyer for Marks said then that his client would be willing to testify against Santos if asked.

Sam Miele, a former fundraiser for Santos, pleaded guilty a month later to a federal wire fraud charge, admitting he impersonated a high-ranking congressional aide while raising money for Santos’ campaign.

House Republican investigators accused President Joe Biden of engaging in “impeachable conduct” as part of a long-awaited report. It’s unlikely to change a reality the party has faced for months: They don’t have the votes to impeach him.

The 291-page report released Monday by the Oversight, Judiciary and Ways and Means committees comes roughly eight months after Republicans formalized their impeachment inquiry against the president. Their sweeping investigations, largely focused on the business deals of Biden’s family members, have gone on even longer, informally starting around the time they first took the House majority in January 2023.

Republicans on the committees are accusing Biden of two offenses they argue meet the bar for impeachable conduct: abuse of power and obstruction. They’re the same charges that House Democrats cited in the 2019 impeachment against then-President Donald Trump — an inquiry frequently mentioned in the House GOP report.

“The Constitution’s remedy for a President’s flagrant abuse of office is clear: impeachment by the House of Representatives and removal by the Senate,” the committees write in the report, adding they are releasing the report to the House “for its evaluation and consideration of appropriate next steps.”

Even as Republicans noted on Monday that the inquiry remains ongoing, the report marks a soft end for the impeachment effort; two leading investigators told POLITICO last month that their probes had largely wrapped up. Some Judiciary Committee Republicans have pushed to hold public hearings on impeachment articles, but Chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) didn’t commit to that step in a recent interview, instead indicating the decision about where to go next is up to the larger conference.

Not holding an impeachment vote on the House floor would constitute a historical anomaly: Every formal presidential impeachment inquiry in modern times has led to an impeachment vote — except in the case of Richard Nixon, who resigned from office before a vote could happen. It also risks irritating the party’s base, which has pushed for a quicker impeachment against the president, though that focus has since shifted to Kamala Harris.

But Republicans have been dozens of votes short of impeaching Biden for months. Much of their investigation, and Monday’s report, focused on business deals and money received by Hunter and James Biden, as well as Joe Biden’s handling of classified documents and the years-long federal investigation into his son. Investigators, for example, say they traced $27 million in payments to Biden family members and their associates from foreign entities. They also delved deeply into “loans” received by Hunter and James Biden, the president’s son and brother, respectively.

Republicans uncovered examples of Hunter and James Biden leaning on their last name and their connection to Joe Biden to bolster their own influence. For example, some former Hunter Biden associates, in closed-door interviews, told lawmakers that Hunter Biden would put his father on speakerphone during meetings with potential business partners, though they said that the conversation was limited to pleasantries. In other instances, witnesses recalled Joe Biden stopping by dinners or lunches — but that business wasn’t discussed at those moments.

Much of Republicans’ abuse of power charge focuses on Hunter and James Biden’s business deals or loans they received, arguing that they likely wouldn’t have happened unless Joe Biden had been in office. The three Bidens, and some of their former business associates, have said repeatedly that Joe Biden was not involved in the business agreements.

For their second offense, obstruction, Republicans focused on both their own sprawling investigation and the years-long federal probe into Hunter Biden. IRS whistleblowers have accused Biden administration officials of stymying the latter — allegations repeatedly rebuffed by Attorney General Merrick Garland and special counsel David Weiss. Republicans also referenced their ongoing court battle to try to force the Justice Department to hand over audio of Joe Biden’s interview with former special counsel Robert Hur, rather than just the transcripts.

But while they poked holes in previous statements by Joe Biden and the White House, Republicans have struggled to find the proverbial smoking gun that would garner the near-unanimous GOP support needed to impeach the president. Investigators, in Monday’s report, argue that they don’t need to show evidence that Joe Biden committed a crime — but some of their skeptical colleagues have said that is the bar leaders need to clear to earn their impeachment vote.

The impeachment efforts have drawn fierce scrutiny from congressional Democrats, the White House and even some current and former GOP colleagues. In a preview of their likely response to the report, Democrats have for months touted the investigation as an ultimate exoneration of Joe Biden, since it is likely to end without action.

“I think we did our job. We followed the money,” Oversight Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) said in a recent interview.

And he repeated a frequent argument from GOP leaders: That they only formalized the impeachment inquiry late last year “to try to have better standing in court to get documents. It didn’t have anything to do with impeachment.”

New Jersey Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr. is once again in the hospital, just days after being discharged following a lengthy stay and less than three months before Election Day.

Pascrell, 87, was discharged from St. Joseph’s in Paterson Wednesday following a three-week stay for a respiratory infection and fever, at one point being placed on breathing assistance. He checked out and entered a rehabilitation facility but checked into St. Barnabas in Livingston on Sunday evening.

“He is now stable,” chief of staff Ben Rich said. “We will provide updates whenever possible and remain hopeful he will be able to resume his rehabilitation soon.”

The congressmember — the second oldest current member of the House and set to be the oldest next session if he wins reelection — easily won the Democratic primary in June and is seeking a 15th term in the House.

Pascrell also had heart surgery in 2020 to relieve blocked arteries.

Even before Pascrell’s recent health problems, his advanced age led to Democrats positioning themselves to run for his seat, though two high-profile potential Democratic contestants — state Assemblymember Shavonda Sumter and Paterson Mayor Andre Sayegh — felt out runs this year before ultimately opting not to.

Prospect Park Mayor Mohamed Khairullah challenged Pascrell in the primary largely over the war in Gaza, but Pascrell won 77 percent of the vote.

Pascrell in November faces his third straight challenge from Republican Billy Prempeh, whom he defeated by 12 points in 2022. Though Pascrell’s district is less Democratic-dominated than before boundaries were redrawn in redistricting, no major publications that rate House elections have flagged the race as competitive.

It’s not yet clear whether Pascrell’s continued health problems will lead to pressure for him to step aside. The deadline to replace Pascrell on the ballot is August 29.

Pascrell’s hospital stay was not widely known in political circles until early Monday. Reached by phone on Monday morning, Passaic County Democratic Chair John Currie was shocked to hear the news.

Currie said he was relieved to hear he was in stable condition and expressed support for Pascrell so long as he chooses to seek reelection.

“I am confident, and until I have a conversation with him, I am 100 percent supportive of his candidacy,” Currie said. “He’s a reasonable man. We’ve worked together for a long time. And yes, I’m going to support him. If he’s not able to run, he will say so.”

If Pascrell opted to drop his reelection bid, his party’s nominee would be selected by Democratic committee members from the district’s towns in Passaic, Bergen and Hudson counties.

Sumter, in a brief interview Monday, said there was “no talk of any changes” to changing Pascrell as the nominee and said “right now we’re all just praying for his health and strength.”

Daniel Han contributed to this report.

Progressive Democrats just watched pro-Israel super PACs spend jaw-dropping sums to wipe out two top liberals in Congress. And leaders fear they have no way to stop it from happening again in 2026.

Those groups, chiefly the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s super PAC, spent a combined $25 million on ads to defeat Reps. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) and Cori Bush (D-Mo.) this summer in what became the two most expensive House primaries ever. As a result, two more mainstream Democrats, George Latimer in New York and Wesley Bell in Missouri, are advancing in safe blue districts rather than two stalwart progressive voices.

After both Bowman and Bush crumbled under that avalanche of spending, prompted by their criticism of Israel in the country’s war with Hamas, progressive Democrats have awoken to a bleak new reality that could haunt them for years to come: They have no organized way to counter that kind of money. And they fear AIPAC and allied groups will be more empowered to take on even bigger targets next cycle and beyond because they know their strategy works.

“I think they smell success,” Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said of AIPAC in an interview with POLITICO. “The point is not just them going after Jamaal and Cori, which is terrible. It is the intimidating presence they have over every member of Congress. … It bothers me that there hasn’t been more outrage.”

In the days after Bush’s defeat last week, senior liberals in Congress, including Sanders, have begun to reckon with the size of the problem. Until then, progressives were not sure if AIPAC’s success against Bowman, who had plenty of his own political flaws unrelated to the Middle East, could be replicated. Then Bush’s loss rattled progressives even more.

What Sanders and others have grimly surmised is that they have no way to match AIPAC’s power, with no big-money fundraising machine and no powerful nationwide door-knocking operation. And while progressives boast large numbers and significant power in Congress, they fear that those pro-Israel super PACs will continue to target high-profile lawmakers one by one, as well as quash new liberal candidates in open seats who the PACs also see as overly critical of Israel. That could make it harder to grow their ranks and potentially silence those already elected, particularly on support for Palestine, a galvanizing issue for younger liberal voters especially.

“The movement is going to have to do some deep soul searching,” said Nina Turner, a prominent progressive who lost her own House primary three years ago to an AIPAC-backed challenger. “The progressive movement has to show up in a deeper way. It did not.”

Turner, along with other progressive Democrats, say the left has no choice but to start organizing their own counterweight specifically focused on combating the pro-Israel money, adding: “So the movement itself is going to have to adjust very quickly.”

United Democracy Project, AIPAC’s super PAC, firmly pushed back on the idea that their spending is at odds with the left.

“We have been proud to support progressive champions who are pro-Israel like Latimer and Bell,” said Patrick Dorton, a spokesperson for the group. “These are candidates that will support the progressive agenda in Congress.”

The reckoning hasn’t been universal. Some progressive operatives dismissed the losses as minor setbacks to a movement that has been on the rise since 2016, and privately argued that Bowman and Bush were weak politically and therefore more likely to draw challengers. They argue that some liberal incumbents need to do better at deepening relationships in their districts and raising their own funds — as Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) have done — to ward off serious opponents.

But others worried that many on the left are not clear-eyed about the full scope of the problem. Some believe the way the war in Gaza has galvanized pro-Israel donors is a dire threat to the future of the movement.

“There’s reason for them to be panicked,” said Mark Mellman, the president of Democratic Majority for Israel, which joined AIPAC in opposing Bowman and Bush and also played in open-seat races. “The Squad has been diminished. That’s a fact, and we prevented more people who would have joined it from getting elected.”

Beyond Bowman and Bush

The first truly powerful pro-Israel groups came on the scene in earnest in 2021 with a blockbuster special election in northeast Ohio.

The front-runner was Turner, a former co-chair of Sanders’ presidential campaign who was known for her colorful language. She led in polls and fundraising for much of the race. But Mellman’s group swooped in with a $1 million infusion of cash to boost her opponent, now-Rep. Shontel Brown, over the finish line.

“No question that the Brown-Turner race was a turning point,” Mellman said.

With a blueprint set, AIPAC joined Democratic Majority for Israel in earnest in the 2022 midterms. Both focused on primary races, where their money would go even further. They had the biggest success playing in open seats and electing members like now-Reps. Glenn Ivey (D-Md.) and Don Davis (D-N.C.).

This year, they turned their sights to incumbents. And the war in Gaza turbocharged their donor base, allowing them to drop historic amounts of money into congressional races. Dorton, the spokesperson for AIPAC’s super PAC, called the Oct. 7 attacks “a turning point for pro-Israel donors and activists in America.”

It’s not just the mega-successful takedowns against Bowman and Bush: The pro-Israel groups quickly realized they can choke off potential progressive additions by spending against them in safe-seat primaries. Those races don’t always get national attention but thwart attempts to grow the liberal caucus. Pro-Israel donors boosted Sarah Elfreth in an open Maryland House district, and also spent in an open Arizona seat where the race is headed for a recount.

“It shapes who gets elected as Democrats in Congress. It’s bigger than any one race, it’s about — what does the Democratic caucus as a whole look like?” said a progressive campaign operative, granted anonymity to speak candidly. “The Democratic party as a whole needs to have a larger conversation about, ‘Are we gonna call this out?’”

‘AIPAC is gonna go after the wounded bear cub’

Even progressive Democrats admit that both Bowman and Bush had serious political liabilities. Bowman’s was especially obvious: He pleaded guilty to setting off a false fire alarm in the Capitol complex last year. Bush, meanwhile, is under federal investigation after hiring her now-husband to provide her security and paying him out of a campaign account.

Other high-profile progressives, including what’s known as the Squad, have been careful to raise enough cash and build enough relationships back home to stave off challengers. AIPAC decided not to spend, for instance, against Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) in her primary on Tuesday after they failed to land a strong challenger against her.

This cycle, Omar is facing the same challenger but is expected to easily win her race after shoring up her own political operation. After a near-miss in 2022, Omar strengthened ties in her district, hired a strong campaign team and raised serious cash — a whopping $6.8 million as of late July.

Another rising progressive, Rep. Summer Lee (D-Pa.), strategically avoided a well-funded challenge, in part, by working with Jewish communities in her district. She bowed out of an event with a Muslim group after backlash over antisemitic comments made by other speakers. But Omar, Tlaib and others are only safe because the pro-Israel groups couldn’t land challengers they felt were worth backing.

“They’ll pick, and they’ll choose,” Sanders said, summarizing AIPAC’s strategy. And he warned it would have a chilling effect on Democrats willing to talk about sensitive issues — particularly against Israel and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“How many people do you think are prepared to get involved in that?” Sanders said. “Every politician in the world has liabilities and $10 million can accentuate those liabilities.”

One Democratic leadership aide, granted anonymity to speak frankly, summed it up like this: “AIPAC is gonna go after the wounded bear cub.”

What’s next?

No progressive expects they can compete with the flood of AIPAC cash dollar for dollar. Some are playing the long game — angling for campaign finance reform and trying to label AIPAC as a vehicle for Republicans to meddle in Democratic primaries.

“The goal is not to say: ‘How can we scale up to $20 million so then we can have this disgusting, destructive effect on our democracy through these elections,’” said Usamah Andrabi, a spokesperson for the progressive PAC Justice Democrats. “At a certain point someone needs to be an adult in the room and say: ‘This is bad for our democracy.’”

Some, like Sanders, have tried to get their party to completely ban super PACs in Democratic primaries. But a solution like that is years, if not decades, away from coming to fruition. And the pro-Israel groups are already gearing up for 2026. Other progressives have tried to get more organized and fight back with groups that already exist, like the Congressional Progressive Caucus’ own PAC.

But there’s a big — and awkward — constraint. The CPC is one of the largest member groups on the Hill, with nearly 100 lawmakers. But “progressive” can be a wide spectrum. The group includes members like Brown, the Ohio candidate who defeated Turner with help from pro-Israel donors. And it might just welcome the two Democrats who beat Bowman and Bush this fall: Latimer and Bell, respectively.

“We have a criteria. And if he meets the criteria, I don’t see why not,” Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.) told POLITICO after Latimer beat Bowman earlier this summer. “Obviously, anyone who wants to be a progressive in Congress is welcome in the caucus.”

Brakkton Booker and Nicholas Wu contributed to this report.