Twenty-five years after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Congress remains vulnerable to a mass casualty event that could cripple the federal government for months.
On that Tuesday morning in 2001, only a handful of representatives were in the House chamber when Speaker Dennis Hastert called it to order. Rep. Earl Blumenauer was one of three members scheduled to speak. Most lawmakers were in their personal offices, preparing for the day's votes, hearings and meetings.
Across the Capitol, senators were debating the annual Commerce Department spending legislation. Majority Leader Tom Daschle was in his office with former Sen. John Glenn.
By 9:45 a.m. as planes struck the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, legislators began fleeing the Capitol. Speaker Hastert, Majority Leader Daschle and other top leaders were whisked away to an undisclosed location in Virginia by Capitol Police.
Congress proved ill-prepared. The House had no procedure to halt business. Rep. Porter Goss, the only Republican in the chamber when the evacuation began, put the House in session for one minute so the chaplain could offer a prayer before recessing it.
More critically, Congress had no policies to resume operations if the Capitol were destroyed or if many legislators were killed. The Constitution vests Congress with the majority of federal powers. A crippled Congress could have left the federal government paralyzed for months—a fate averted only by passengers on United Airlines Flight 93 who stormed the cockpit and brought the plane down near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
On Sept. 11, none of the 13 annual spending bills had become law. All were set to expire at month's end. If Congress had been destroyed, a shutdown would have compounded the national crisis.
Congress has made limited improvements since then. It adopted rules enabling rapid recesses and requires the speaker to produce a list of legislators who can temporarily discharge critical duties such as presiding over sessions and overseeing operations.
Yet the institution has not fully resolved its continuity-of-government challenges. John Fortier, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute who served as executive director of a continuity commission, said Congress must be ready to act during a national emergency.
Modern threats compound the risk. A senior Department of Homeland Security official told the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2025 that roughly 150 drones per day were detected crossing the U.S.-Mexico border during the first half of 2025. Bipartisan congressional legislation to enhance legal authorities for DHS and the Justice Department to counter drone threats and improve the FAA's ability to thwart them has not yet passed.
The lack of comprehensive planning for congressional continuity remains a critical national security gap.
