🍻 In This Week’s Hill Spill: Haley Stevens Wasn't Invited, a GOP Fight That Doesn't Include Dana White and Jim Jordan Is Your Fair Leader

🍹 Welcome to this week’s Hill Spill, your favorite Capitol Hill happy hour-themed newsletter! The leadership races are over, the incoming class can’t stop taking selfies, and House Republicans are settling into life in the minority.

This week: Michigan Democrats keep posing for group photos without Haley Stevens, Congress’ longtime doctor is out, Jim Jordan takes over as House GOP leader and a 71-year-old challenges a former boxer to a fight. On the pod, Semafor’s Shelby Talcott talks Susie Wiles’ exit and potential mass pardons.

It’s tea time so grab a bev and let’s get into it. 🍸

Over the past few days, ecstatic Michigan Democrats on the Hill have been taking a lot of photos and selfies. It’s hard to find any pic of an elected or incoming Michigan official that doesn’t include either a grinning Senator-elect Abdul El-Sayed or Representative-elect Donavan McKinney. It’s much harder to find outgoing Representative Haley Stevens alongside any of her soon-to-be-former colleagues.

On Tuesday, incoming members of the delegation as well as retiring Senator Gary Peters took a group pic during a breakfast meeting.

Missing from the photos was Stevens. That fits an emerging pattern for the outgoing congresswoman, who narrowly lost the Democratic nomination for Senate to El-Sayed and would go on to make a last-minute endorsement of former Rep. Mike Rogers, the Republican nominee for Senate in Michigan. The endorsement, and Stevens’ hard-to-follow explanation for backing Rogers, essentially excommunicated her from Michigan Democratic Party circles. She hasn’t exactly kept a low profile but Stevens has been ducking out of events with fellow Michigan Democrats in D.C. or previously planned public appearances.

Instead, she hung out in the Republican cloakroom on Monday during House votes. She also wasn’t present with other congressional Democrats during an ill-fated vote on impeaching Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. Her office is empty after Stevens’ staff quit in protest over the Rogers endorsement.

Let’s remember, though. Michigan’s 2026 Senate race was one of the most acrimonious fights of the entire cycle. El-Sayed and, for instance, returning Representative Hillary Scholten aren’t exactly besties. But they’re both joining in on the group photos (like the one above).

When we reached Stevens by text about her absence from the breakfast, she said she wasn’t invited but there were no hard feelings.

“Without offense or expectation, I was not invited,” Stevens wrote in a text to Daniel. “Believe it was for returning members with the outgoing Senator, note Shri Thanader [sic] and Kristen McDonald Rivet are also not featured.”

Fair enough, but Thanedar (who actually ran in a primary against El-Sayed once upon a time) and Rivet both endorsed El-Sayed, kept supporting him, and ended up at the breakfast. Peters actually supported Stevens in the primary before backing El-Sayed in the general election and was at the breakfast too.

It’s just one data point but there aren’t many indicators to counter the mounting evidence that Stevens won’t be invited to many more Michigan Democratic events in the near future.

It’s kind of like she’s Michigan’s very own version of Carmen Sandiego.

Item by Daniel Strauss

Congress’ attending physician just got canned, and as one member joked to us, for lawmakers who like a little Ambien to get through long CODEL flights, this is not a great development for them.

Rear Adm. Brian Monahan, who’s been in the job since 2009, was removed by the Navy amid an investigation into misconduct allegations, Punchbowl News first reported. (Guess Rep. Michael Baumgartner’s wild demand to stop the leaks didn’t quite take, lol.) His deputy, a civilian, was also fired.

The Office of the Attending Physician, which the Navy runs, handles health care for lawmakers, staff, and Supreme Court justices. For nearly two decades, Monahan has been the guy checking the blood pressure of some of the most stressed-out people in America, which is not a job we envy.

The news caught a few members off guard, with one telling us it may have been the most shocking news of the month. It is a little rogue, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves—it has been a weird month and it’s only the 12th. One GOP lawmaker who said they loved the guy offered us a fun fact about Monahan: “Great photographer. His travel pics of historic sites and safari animals were all over the office.”

Honestly, we may need to slide into his DMs about learning to up our Instagram game.

A source familiar with the situation filled us in on some of the lore of what allegedly went down. The Naval Inspector General has been investigating the office for at least a year, the source said, and the Department of War’s inspector general has been looking into it too, with a report expected as soon as Friday. A second source also confirmed that the investigation has been underway for some time.

“There are some issues surrounding practices for prescribing controlled substances,” the source told us. There were also toxic workplace allegations, “mainly stemming from the chief of staff’s handling of the office.”

“It got to the point where several personnel assigned there submitted safety transfers to the Navy,” the source said. “And with the knowledge of an alleged unsafe work environment, the Navy couldn’t replace the people who had transferred out.”

Meanwhile, “senators were personally advocating on behalf of Monahan to the Navy,” according to the source. “As the office staff dwindled, it got to the point where the decision had to be made between Monahan and a functioning OAP.”

We’ll be watching for that IG report. In the meantime, members, particularly those over 70 reading this, please take your vitamins and drink some water. We lost some sources in the election—we want to retain the living ones that we have, so take care of yourselves, y’all!

Item by Juliegrace Brufke 

A Capitol Hill reporter and a White House reporter walk into a bar…Sources Say very happily welcomes Semafor’s Shelby Talcott to the pod. Hear all she has to say about Susie, JD and mass pardons…

Scoop: Before Election Day, Rep.-elect Anthony Constantino (R-N.Y.) texted Bruce Blakeman, then the GOP nominee for governor, pushing him to turn on two of the state’s top party bosses, GOP Chair Ed Cox and Conservative Party Chair Gerard Kassar, according to a screenshot of the exchange we obtained. “If you were tough and smart you would come out against Kassar and Cox,” Constantino wrote. “You sound very weak right now and citizens don’t like weak.”

Blakeman’s reply: “After the election you and I can get in the ring and find out who is tougher. For now don’t get distracted by what other people say and do. It’s what YOU do. Ok I’m getting back to work.”

Blakeman did not respond to our request for comment. We’re going to assume it’s because he’s busy training.

Bold move for Blakeman, who is 71, to challenge Constantino, a former boxer, to a fight, but OK. (Blakeman did have Mike Tyson at his Syracuse rally last month, so maybe he was counting on backup?)

New York Republicans lost big last week, and the knives came out fast. Blakeman lost to Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) by roughly 20 points, Constantino won, and the gloves are still on. Blakeman has since called Constantino “by far the worst candidate I ever encountered,” claiming he wouldn’t have won without him. Constantino fired back that Blakeman is “a perpetual wannabe who lost by a lot because he’s lazy, dumb and pretentious.”

Blakeman’s also got beef with outgoing Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), whose seat Constantino is filling. Stefanik was running for governor until she dropped out last December, shortly after Blakeman jumped in. The day after the election, she told the Post that Blakeman ran a “low-energy” campaign and that the state party is “broken.” Blakeman hit back in a post on X, labeling her “a selfish, do nothing politician” who “had one moment of glory in what was otherwise an unremarkable career.”

Stefanik shot back that she voted for Blakeman and the whole GOP ticket, and that she’s helped raise more than $100 million for Republicans over the years. Hochul, enjoying the show, weighed in with a boxing referee GIF. Honestly, same.

As for Constantino, the Sticker Mule CEO first made a name for himself by slapping a massive “Vote for Trump” sign on his Amsterdam, N.Y., headquarters in 2024. On election night, he gave an expletive-filled victory speech, called out reporters in the room, had one thrown out and called on Trump to consider freeing Diddy, making him a rare Free Diddy advocate in the incoming GOP class.

We love New York and we love other people’s drama so we’re v excited about this story.

We look forward to getting to know the full cast of characters in the next Congress. 🍿

Item by Juliegrace Brufke 

Three years after Republicans dumped him as their speaker nominee, Jim Jordan is set to run the House GOP.

House Republicans picked the Judiciary chair (R-Ohio) to lead them in the minority on Tuesday, beating Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) 106-73. Both camps felt good going in, but a secret ballot and a lot of undecided freshmen made the whip counts shaky. Scalise, who’s been in GOP leadership for more than a decade and remains well liked across the conference, told us he wouldn’t do anything differently and is proud of his team and the race they ran.

At the morning candidate forum, contenders got just 30 seconds to answer each question. Not a lot of time to explain a historic loss. The elections went ahead even after Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith (R-Mo.) pushed for a delay, and Trump stayed out of it, declining twice to pick a side.

Further down the ballot, the incumbents who ran held on. Whip Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) beat RSC Chair August Pfluger (R-Texas) 103-76, with one vote going to Mike Johnson. 

 Conference Chair Lisa McClain (R-Mich.) won on the first ballot with 93 votes to Rep. Erin Houchin’s (R-Ind.) 57 and Rep. Greg Steube’s (R-Fla.) 27. 

And Rep. Brian Jack (R-Ga.) cruised past Rep. Rudy Yakym (R-Ind.) 125-53 to take over the NRCC from Rep. Richard Hudson (R-N.C.), who lost his own seat. Rep. Mark Alford (R-Mo.) is set to be the new conference secretary.

And yes, results from the closed-door vote were leaking in real time. Rep. Michael Baumgartner is probs not thrilled. 

In the Senate, Republicans stuck with John Thune (R-S.D.), who ran unopposed, after voting 31-15 to reject Sen. Ron Johnson’s (R-Wis.) push to delay. Johnson left the room as promised, insisting it was never about Thune. The only new face in Senate GOP leadership is Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio), who’ll chair the NRSC, starting with his own backyard, where his colleague Jon Husted just lost.

House Democrats hold their leadership elections Nov. 18 and 19. There’s been some minor drama, but it sounds like Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) has the speaker nomination pretty locked up.

Chuck Schumer’s road back to majority leader is lookin a tad bumpier. Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) have said they won’t back him, and several incoming freshmen are holding out too. But he only needs a simple majority of a 54-plus-seat caucus in a vote expected next month, and being the guy who just won the majority helps. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Confession: we’ve always had a soft spot for the House, since nobody does chaos quite like them and we love them for it. But things are getting mildly more spicy across the Capitol, so we’re planning on giving the upper chamber a little more love. Senators, our DMs are open for all of your drama.

Item by Juliegrace Brufke

Cheers to Daniel Strauss for writing the top of the newsletter this week! He wanted an Aviation, but we did that one semi-recently, so we made him pick something else (sorry, Daniel). His backup plan was  a za'atar margarita. We approved.

It's essentially a spicy marg, except the rim is za'atar instead of chili salt. If you've never had it, za'atar is a Middle Eastern spice blend with thyme, oregano, sumac and sesame. This particular recipe comes from Elena Besser.

The recipe:

Shake the tequila, lime juice, orange liqueur, agave and ½ teaspoon of the za'atar with ice. For the rim, mix the remaining 2 teaspoons of za'atar with the salt on a small plate, run a lime wedge around the glass and dip it in. Strain over fresh ice and garnish with lime.

Thanks for pouring, Daniel! 🍋

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