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Rep. Steny Hoyer, the former Democratic House majority leader and one of the party's longest serving members of Congress, will formally announce his retirement on Thursday (January 8), his office confirmed to ABC News.
Hoyer, 86, is set to announce that he won't seek re-election on the House floor at 10:00 a.m. ET. The Maryland congressman spent two decades as former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's deputy and is following her plans as she's also prepared to leave Congress at the end of 2026, with the Democratic party focusing on a new generation of leadership moving forward.
Hoyer and Pelosi both served as congressional interns in the 1960s years before taking on major roles in the Democratic party and Hoyer was seen as a key negotiating partner for Republicans, maintaining better relationships with his counterparts than Pelosi, according to ABC News. Hoyer was initially elected to the U.S. House of Representatives for Maryland's 5th district in 1981 and served as the vice chair of the House Democratic caucus in 1989; the chair of the House Democratic caucus from 1989 to 1995; the House minority whip from 2011 to 2019; and the House majority leader from 2019 to 2023.
Democrats are now reportedly focused on whether Rep. Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, the longtime No. 3 Democrat, will follow similar plans to Pelosi and Hoyer after previously planning to run for re-election in 2027.