Washington, D.C., is used to power plays, but not the kind on display from lawmakers and lobbyists at the 2026 Congressional Hockey Challenge on Thursday night.
At the MedStar Capitals Iceplex, a bipartisan team of officials and staff took the ice to face off against some of the districts’ finest lobbyists in their annual hockey game for charity.
The lobbyists took home the trophy in a 4-3 thriller, defeating the lawmaker team—rumored to be too concerned with another kind of ICE—in an exciting overtime shootout.
The game raised a record breaking nearly $200,000 for charity.
“It’s pretty incredible to do it two years in a row after losing seven or eight in a row. But to be fair, I was on the other team, so maybe that’s what secret is here,” Lobbyist Matthew Flynn told The Daily Signal, shortly after chugging a beer out of the trophy cup.
“Part of the problem is our coaching is pretty weak, with [Republican Rep.] Pete Stauber from Hermantown, Minnesota,” Majority Whip Tom Emmer, R-Minn., sarcastically told the press after losing the game. “I told him that we’re gonna have to have a talk about his contract for next year,” he continued joking.
Emmer hasn’t skated in 16 months but was joined on the ice by his teammate son, Jack Emmer, a staffer on the House Oversight Committee.
“It makes you feel older, but it’s so much fun,” Emmer, 62, told The Daily Signal as his family joined the father and son duo on the ice. “I mean, I got a son who’s playing, I got a grandson, and a granddaughter who are here, and our daughter-law.”
The stands were full of loyal, and slightly buzzed, staffers who came out to support their bosses. The upstairs bar for staffers ran out of beer shortly after the puck dropped.
But there was beer somewhere in the arena, as Stauber’s staff could be seen running the congressman beers to the player’s bench while staffers of Rep. George Whitesides, D-Calif., were seen cheering and waving handmade posters that read “Gooooooo Whitesides!”
FBI Director Kash Patel also got in on the action. Celebrating Olympic gold with Team USA’s men’s hockey team in Milan seemed to give the FBI director something extra on the ice as Patel was frequently seen mixing it up on the boards and fighting for loose pucks.
Two goals from Billy Dwyer, senior policy adviser for Rep. Robin Kelly, D-Ill., and another from Rob MacGregor, a staffer from the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, had the lawmakers locked in a 3-3 tie with the lobbyists. Eetu Höglund from UPS scored two goals for the lobbyists, and Dan Martini from eBay scored one.
The game then headed to overtime, where things got more serious.
What some might call a brawl broke out on the ice, landing two lobbyists and one staffer from the House Homeland Security Committee in the penalty box.
After some pleading and negotiating with the referee, and some boos from the crowd, the staffer was released. The incident, however, led some in the crowd to suggest that Capitol Hill might be a better place if some penalty boxes were installed.
The lawmakers lost after the first three penalty shooters failed to score, and the lobbyists’ penalty shooters—John Jukuri from the NCSL Foundation, Will Bensur from Firehouse Strategies, and Michelle MacGregor from Orrick—all found the back of the net.
Now that the lobbyists have taken home the crown, the two sides can go back to fighting over the other kind of ICE—Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
