Reporter’s Notebook: The unseen heroes of Congress

Their names don’t hang on a nameplate by the office door.

They don’t appear on the ballot in November.

They lack a Congressional voting card. 

They are the unseen in politics. They are Congressional aides. 

REPORTER’S NOTEBOOK: SITTING ON THE TARMAC

Congressional staffers come in all forms and age-ranges.

There are the grizzled, budget reconciliation and House Rules Committee veterans in their sixties who have roamed Capitol Hill since the Speakership of Jim Wright, D-Texas, in the late 1980s. But you also find the whip-smart, 21-year-old who just graduated from Elon, answering the phones at the front desk of a freshman office on the sixth floor of Longworth House Office Building.

And then there are all of the aides in between. 

Chiefs of staff. Policy experts on U.S. territories. Staffers who toil on Judiciary Committee nominations. Professional investigators from the Oversight Committee. Economists from the Joint Economic Committee. Social media managers. Speech writers.

They work late at night, crafting bill text in the office of Legislative Counsel deep in the bowels of the Cannon House Office Building. They rise before the crack of dawn on Sunday to refine talking points before their boss appears on a Sunday show. 

They stand, just out of the shot, holding umbrellas over the heads of Congressmen so they aren’t drenched during a pop-up July thunderstorm during a news conference at the House Triangle. Male aides sometimes stand off to the side, holding the purse of a female lawmaker.

“This is my favorite part of the job,” joked one aide sardonically years ago, while clasping the shoulder bag of his boss during a photo op.

No one notices the aides if things go well. The speech goes off without a hitch. The amendment garners bipartisan support. Perhaps the aides score a pat on the back by the boss. An extra day off.

But people notice if things don’t go well.

And in those instances, that’s where the lawmaker gets the blame. The person with the nameplate on the door. The name on the ballot. The voting card.

This is why most lawmakers are keenly aware of how the aides who work in obscurity are essential to their success —…