85-year-old longtime House Democrat facing primary challenger who's making age a key issue

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Longtime Democratic Maryland Rep. Steny Hoyer has yet to announce whether he will seek re-election next year for a 24th two-year term in Congress.

If he does, he will face a primary challenger who is making Hoyer's age - the congressman turns 86 next month and would be 89 at the end of his next term - a centerpiece of his campaign.

Harry Jarin, 35, a volunteer firefighter and emergency services' consultant, said Thursday in a new video announcing his candidacy, "If you live here in southern Maryland, I want to ask you a tough question. Do you really think that Steny Hoyer, at 89-years-old, is the best person to represent us?" 

Jarin argued that "we're in a moment of real crisis. Radical Republicans are burning down our country around us. Our friends and family who work in the government are losing their jobs. We keep sending politicians like Steny Hoyer back to Congress again and again. Tired politicians like Steny can't put up a fight that we need."

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"Here's the bottom line: you don't put out a fire by sending in the same people who let it spread. Send in a firefighter," Jarin said. "Maryland deserves a new generation of leadership, and I'm ready to take up the fight."

And in an interview with Fox News Digital, Jarin said: "I think we're facing a really serious constitutional crisis….Congress has really declined as an institution over the last three or four years. Congress has surrendered a lot of its legislative power under the Constitution over to the executive branch. I think that's been very corrosive to our political system."

Asked about his motivation to primary challenge Hoyer, Jarin said, "It's not just about getting someone younger and fresher in. It's getting someone in who understands the need to revitalize Congress as an institution."

Fox News reached out to Hoyer's office for a response, but a spokesperson declined to respond.

Hoyer, who first won his seat in Congress in a 1981 special election, from 2003 to 2023, was the second ranking House Democrat behind Rep. Nancy Pelosi. He served as House Majority Leader from 2007-2011 and from 2019-2023, when the Democrats controlled the chamber.

Along with Pelosi, Hoyer stepped down from his longtime leadership position at the end of 2022 but remained in Congress.  

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"I think all of us have been around for some time and pretty much have a feel for the timing of decisions. And I think all three of us felt that this was the time," Hoyer told CNN at the time, as he referred to the moves by the top three House Democrats - Pelosi, Hoyer and Rep. Jim Clyburn - to step down from their leadership roles.

Hoyer has long been a major backer of the Democrats' top issues, and during his second tenure as House Majority Leader, he played a crucial role in the passage of then-President Joe Biden's so-called American Rescue Plan and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

He represents Maryland's Democrat-dominated 5th Congressional District, which covers a region known as Southern Maryland, and includes the suburbs south and east of Washington D.C., a sliver of suburban Baltimore and Annapolis, as well as rural areas farther south. 

Hoyer, who suffered a minor stroke last year, is the latest high-ranking House Democrat to face a primary challenge from a younger opponent.

Pelosi and Reps. Brad Sherman of California and Jan Schakowsky of Illinois have drawn primary challenges, with Schakowsky later announcing that she will no longer run for re-election.

Jarin told Fox News that when he spoke with voters in the district about Hoyer, they had concerns about the incumbent's age.

"The main reaction I got when I asked people about Steny Hoyer was first and foremost his age," Jarin said. "The idea that he would be close to 90 years old at the end of the next term is just a little bit nuts for people. I think people are starting to process how extreme a situation that is."

The primary challenges come as Democrats are still trying to regroup following last November's election setbacks, when the party lost control of the White House and their Senate majority, and came up short in their bid to win back the House.

The party's base is angry and energized to push back against the sweeping and controversial moves by President Donald Trump in the four months since he returned to the White House.

Additionally, while much of that anger and energy is directed at fighting the White House and congressional Republicans, some of it is targeted at Democrats whom many in the party's base feel aren't vocal enough in their efforts to stymie Trump.

Concurrently, other longtime and older House Democrats in safe blue districts are facing the possibility of primary challenges.

This, after newly elected Democratic National Committee Vice Chair David Hogg last month pledged to spend millions of dollars through his outside political group to back primary challenges against what he called "asleep at the wheel" House Democrats - lawmakers he argued have failed to effectively push back against Trump.

The move by the 25-year-old Hogg, a survivor of the horrific shooting seven years ago at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in South Florida, to spend money against fellow Democrats ignited a firestorm within the party.

Jarin said that "we have reached out to David Hogg. We've been in communication."

But Hogg told the Washington Post last month that he wouldn't support primary challenges against either Hoyer, Pelosi, or Clyburn.

As for his ability to raise money for his campaign, Jarin said, "I do come from a political family."

He noted that his husband was a major donor and bundler for former President Joe Biden's successful 2020 campaign and also served as a DNC finance director, and that his uncle had "been a big bundler for Democratic causes for a longtime."

"I think a lot of donors realize that this is a problem but may not be able to say it out loud for fear of repercussions," he argued.

Jarin said that he's received "some pushback from donors for concerns of prioritizing more marginal districts" instead of pouring resources into swing seats as the party aims to win back the House majority in 2026.

"My message to them has been that putting extremely elderly politicians like Steny Hoyer back into office for a 24th term sends a message to voters across the country that Democrats are just the party of status quo and clearly that message has not been working," he highlighted.