The House roll call shows 11 Democrats did not vote when Republicans shelved the Hegseth impeachment resolution by seven votes. Two have confirmed they were at an Elect Democratic Women reception; a lobbyist guest list reported by one outlet has not been independently confirmed.
On the evening of November 10, 2026, the House of Representatives voted 211 to 204 to refer Rep. Thomas Massie’s resolution impeaching Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth (H.Res. 1655) to the Judiciary Committee, which effectively ends the effort for the rest of this Congress. The official House Clerk record of roll call 317 lists 18 members as not voting. Eleven of them were Democrats, a party whose leader, Hakeem Jeffries, had repeatedly promised to “run Pete Hegseth out of town,” as The Washington Post reported.
Within hours, attention turned to where the missing members had been. At least two, Reps. Brittany Pettersen of Colorado and Laura Gillen of New York, have confirmed they were at a “New Member Reception” hosted by Elect Democratic Women (EDW), a political action committee led by House Democratic women. Drop Site News, which says it obtained the event’s RSVP list, reported that the guest list included 132 lobbyists, among them representatives of Lockheed Martin. That list has not been published, and no other outlet has reported seeing it.
What the coverage has blurred
Much of the commentary has fused three separate questions: who was absent, who was at the reception, and who was on the guest list. They rest on very different evidence. The absences are a matter of public record. Attendance at the reception is confirmed on the record for two members and reported, but not confirmed by the members themselves, for two more. The lobbyist roster rests on a single outlet’s account of a document readers cannot inspect.
Several outlets also repeated details that trace back to that one report. Reason’s account of the reception’s 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. schedule links to a post by Drop Site co-founder Ryan Grim, and IBTimes UK attributes the attendee and lobbyist details to Drop Site. That is one source reported several times, not several sources. IBTimes UK also made a point most others omitted: an RSVP list shows who was expected, not who came.
Nor is there any evidence that lobbyists had anything to do with the missed vote. No source reviewed for this article suggests that any guest asked a member to stay, or that the guest list affected anyone’s timing. The members who were at the reception say traffic made them late.
Background: eight articles and a procedural exit
Massie, the Kentucky Republican who is leaving Congress, filed eight articles of impeachment in September. According to Reason’s summary, the first three accuse Hegseth of waging war on Iran against Congress’ wishes after the February 2026 strikes; others concern civilian deaths in Iran and the Caribbean, alleged retaliation against Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), and military operations in Venezuela and Yemen. Hegseth has dismissed the charges as “policy disagreements,” IBTimes UK reported.
Republicans did not vote on the articles themselves. They moved to refer the resolution to committee, a procedural step that lets members avoid a recorded vote on each charge. The Clerk’s tally: 210 Republicans and one independent, Rep. Kevin Kiley of California, voted to refer; 203 Democrats and Massie voted against. Seven Republicans and 11 Democrats did not vote. The Clerk’s record timestamps the vote at 6:02 p.m. Eastern.
Democrats won control of the House in the November 3 midterms and take over in January. As Reuters noted, they could try again next year, but removal requires a two-thirds vote in the Senate, which a Democratic majority cannot supply on its own. RSN covered the Senate side of the new Congress in its report on John Thune’s re-election as Senate Republican leader, and the cost of the Iran war at the center of the articles in the Pentagon’s $47.1 billion estimate.
The 11 absences, member by member
Each member’s stated reason is set out below, with the source for it. Every Democrat who has commented says they would have voted against the motion.
- Lou Correa (Calif.): announced on Monday, before the vote, that he would miss votes for a medical procedure in Orange County and could not travel on his doctor’s advice, the Orange County Register reported. “I vehemently support the impeachment of Secretary Hegseth,” he said. Drop Site described his emergency as a heart attack; Correa’s office, Reuters and ABC News all describe a medical procedure, and RSN found no confirmation of a heart attack.
- Nancy Pelosi (Calif.): was in San Francisco at Swords to Plowshares’ 30th Annual Veterans Day Celebration. Spokesman Ian Krager told ABC News she “supports impeaching Secretary Hegseth and would have voted ‘No’ on the motion to refer.”
- Steven Horsford (Nev.): his office cited a “personal emergency.” In a floor speech the next day, he said, “I missed an important vote. I take full responsibility. The accountability I demand of others applies to me, too,” according to Reuters.
- Brittany Pettersen (Colo.): first posted that she had been “denied the ability to vote.” Her office twice declined to tell 9News in Denver where she was. On Wednesday she said: “Last night, I was late to the floor and there is no excuse for that. I was at an Electing Democratic Women event.” 9News added that available campaign finance records show EDW Action did not spend money on her race.
- Laura Gillen (N.Y.): her office told Newsday she was returning from the EDW reception “about a mile away” when she got stuck in traffic. “Like Rep. Stansbury, I was stuck behind the same police escort blocking the Capitol when Republicans closed the vote,” she wrote.
- Melanie Stansbury (N.M.): her office said she was “blocked from entering the Capitol to vote due a traffic incident and a police escort of a bus” and arrived just after the gavel. “I am so sorry,” she said in a video. Drop Site reports she attended the EDW reception and sits on EDW’s board; her own statements quoted in coverage RSN reviewed do not say where she was coming from.
- Julia Brownley (Calif.): Drop Site reports she attended and is an EDW executive board member. IBTimes UK, citing USA Today, reported she left her car and ran toward the Capitol but “missed it by seconds,” and that she faulted Speaker Mike Johnson for closing the vote. She did not answer Reason’s or ABC’s questions.
- Jonathan Jackson (Ill.): said the traffic incident “caused a delay that resulted in the vote closing before I, along with other Members, could reach the chamber,” ABC reported. Drop Site claims he was seen on the Capitol steps filming a video before the vote closed; RSN found no other outlet reporting that.
- Marilyn Strickland (Wash.): her chief of staff, Andrew Noh, told ABC he was driving her and was “forced to wait for a motorcade to pass by Capitol Police, causing the Congresswoman to miss the vote by 1 minute.”
- Haley Stevens (Mich.): gave no explanation. ABC reports the outgoing member, who lost her Senate primary and then endorsed Republican Mike Rogers, cast two votes Monday and missed all three on Tuesday.
- Frederica Wilson (Fla.): gave no explanation. ABC notes she did not vote Monday or Tuesday and has missed extended periods because of health problems; she was back for votes Wednesday.
ABC News asked the U.S. Capitol Police about the traffic incident several members described and had not heard back at the time of its report. The police escort is therefore attested by the members and their staff, not yet by the police.
The reception and the money
According to Drop Site News, the EDW reception ran from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. at Goldfinch Social, with EDW chair Rep. Lois Frankel (D-Fla.) scheduled to speak at 5:00. Drop Site reports the RSVP list named 132 lobbyists, including at least two from Lockheed Martin and others from firms such as Akin Gump, BGR Group, Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck and K&L Gates, along with technology, pharmaceutical, crypto and union representatives. These details come only from Drop Site. RSN could not inspect the list, and no other outlet has said it obtained a copy.
The money claim, by contrast, can be checked. Drop Site reported that the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s super PAC, United Democracy Project (UDP), put at least $2.35 million into EDW Action this year. Federal Election Commission records show the EDW Action Fund, a hybrid PAC, reporting six receipts from UDP between April 14 and June 24, 2026: $250,000, $350,000, $400,000, $600,000, $400,000 and $350,000. They total exactly $2.35 million.
House Democratic Whip Katherine Clark, whose job is to get members to the floor, is described by Reason and The New Republic as a founder of EDW. EDW did not respond to Reason’s questions. The New Republic reported that eight of the 11 absent Democrats have received support from EDW or its affiliated committee; RSN has not independently checked that count.
Would full attendance have changed the result?
This is where the arithmetic matters. The motion passed 211 to 204. If all 11 Democrats had voted no and nothing else changed, it would have failed 211 to 215, as ABC calculated. But seven Republicans were also absent. If all 18 absentees had voted with their parties, the motion would have passed 218 to 215. Spokespeople for two absent Republicans, Reps. Julia Letlow (R-La.) and Rudy Yakym (R-Ind.), told Reason they would have supported the motion; Letlow’s spokesperson said she ran to the floor and arrived too late.
ABC reported that six of the late Democrats (Brownley, Gillen, Jackson, Pettersen, Stansbury and Strickland) reached the chamber in time for the next vote. Even with those six, the motion would have passed 211 to 210.
Accounts of how long the vote stayed open differ. ABC reported that the vote, scheduled for 15 minutes, was held open for 29, and that members had known about the 5:30 p.m. vote series for at least 18 hours. Reuters reported the vote “was also closed more quickly than usual.” Drop Site put the close at 6:05 p.m.; the Clerk’s record shows 6:02 p.m. RSN could not reconcile the two characterizations; both are reported here.
Analysis: a whip failure, not a conspiracy
The following is RSN analysis. The confirmed record supports a narrower charge than the one circulating online, but a real one. A party that had promised to remove a cabinet officer let a PAC tied to its own leadership hold a reception across town during a scheduled, close floor vote. By Drop Site’s account, the vote was set to open an hour into the event, at rush hour. That is a failure of discipline and of the whip operation. Reuters, citing two unnamed people, reported that Clark told colleagues the absences disappointed the American people; she has not said so on the record.
The episode also illustrates a familiar double standard in how parties talk about influence. Some Democrats, including Sen. Chris Van Hollen, have spent this month attacking party leaders for siding with AIPAC and the crypto industry, The New Republic reported. Meanwhile EDW’s affiliated fund accepted $2.35 million from a single super PAC, and EDW itself, by one outlet’s account, drew a guest list heavy with lobbyists. Lobbyists attending fundraisers is legal and routine in Washington. The point is not illegality; it is that the members who have confirmed attending were, by their own account, at a political event rather than on the floor.
Procedure deserves scrutiny too. By moving to refer rather than voting on the articles, the House majority spared members of both parties a recorded vote on whether the Iran war was lawful. The device is old. RSN readers may recall a 2016 case in which a resolution backing impeachment was killed in a Republican National Committee panel without a vote of the full body. Reason argued that the unusually large number of absences on both sides suggests some members were content not to be recorded.
The other side
The absent Democrats and their defenders have reasonable points. Three of the 11 (Correa, Pelosi and Horsford) gave reasons unrelated to the reception, and nothing reported places Stevens or Wilson there. Several members said a police escort physically blocked the route to the Capitol, and Strickland’s office says she missed the vote by one minute. EDW’s reception marked a record number of newly elected Democratic women, a routine post-election event. Because seven Republicans were also absent, Republican leaders may have had votes in reserve; Drop Site disputes that, noting that only two of the seven absent Republicans won re-election.
Clark’s public statement blamed the majority: “Republicans just blocked the House from impeaching Pete Hegseth,” calling the GOP “a disgrace.” Pettersen argued Johnson “worked overtime to shield” Hegseth, Reuters reported. On the other side, The New Republic reported that President Trump called the result an “exoneration” of Hegseth.
What is established, disputed and not established
Established (public record or on-record statements):
- The motion to refer H.Res. 1655 passed 211 to 204 on November 10, 2026, with 11 Democrats and seven Republicans not voting (House Clerk, roll call 317).
- Pettersen and Gillen were at the EDW reception before the vote, by their own statements.
- The EDW Action Fund reported $2.35 million in receipts from United Democracy Project between April and June 2026 (FEC).
- Correa missed the vote for a pre-announced medical procedure; Pelosi was at a Veterans Day event in San Francisco.
Disputed or reported by one source only:
- The 132-lobbyist RSVP list and the reception’s run of show (Drop Site News only; not published or independently confirmed; shows expected guests, not attendance).
- That Brownley and Stansbury attended the reception (Drop Site; not confirmed in their own statements RSN reviewed).
- Whether the vote closed early (Reuters) or was held open longer than scheduled (ABC).
- That Correa had a heart attack (Drop Site; contradicted by his office’s description of a medical procedure).
- Clark’s private remarks to deputy whips (Reuters, citing one person in the room and another briefed, both unnamed).
Not established:
- Any link between the lobbyists on the reported guest list and any member’s absence.
- That full Democratic attendance would have defeated the motion, given seven Republican absences.
- The traffic incident’s cause and duration; the Capitol Police had not commented as of ABC’s report.
Sources: Office of the Clerk, U.S. House, roll call 317; FEC receipts, EDW Action Fund; Drop Site News; Reason; ABC News; Reuters; The Washington Post; Orange County Register; 9News; Newsday; IBTimes UK; The New Republic.
Featured image: The U.S. Capitol at dusk, by Martin Falbisoner, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
How this article was made: Right Side News researched and drafted this article with the help of AI tools. Sources are linked so readers can check them. Spot an error? Tell us in the comments and we will correct it.
