SCOOP: "Congress wins": Lawmakers vanquish Bad News Babes in annual Congressional Women's Softball Game

Congress scored a rare, huge, and bipartisan win this week with its victory over the press.

In a rarity, Team Congress vanquished the Bad News Babes in the annual Congressional Women’s Softball Game (CWSG) by a score of 5-3.

D.C.’s horrible weather was one of the many MVPs for the lawmakers, resulting in the game being called early due to a torrential downpour.

Still, Team Congress was up 5-3 on the Bad News Babes, and that’s where the game ended.

Amidst the downpour, players and fans alike gathered indoors at Audi Field. This year’s game, the 15th of its kind, was the first one played on both the big field and the big screen.

Thanks to years of CWSG success, multiple networks aired the game so that the lawmakers’ constituents back home could watch them vanquish the journalists.

“Everyone on Team Congress knows what victory feels like, because each and every one of us had to win something to get here,” Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D., Fla.) said during her victory remarks. “And I know each of our victories on Election Night is pretty damn sweet, but my friends, it does not get sweeter than beating the press.”

Rep. Stephanie Bice (R., Okla.), one of Team Congress’s star players, and also the team’s co-captain, got to break the news to the drenched crowd that the rain forced an early ending, and that her team had won.

In a sideline interview with the Washington Reporter immediately following the game’s cancellation, Bice said that her takeaway from the game for her day job is simple: “Congress wins.”

In the Reporter’s estimation, the two best players on Team Congress were Bice in the outfield and Rep. Lisa McClain (R., Mich.) as a hitter.

While many in attendance expressed frustration that Bice was not named as her team’s MVP — that distinction went to Rep. Kathy Castor (D., Fla.) — her mentee in Congress, Rep. Julie Fedorchak (R., N.D.) won the game’s award for best rookie. Rep. Hillary Scholten (D., Mich.) received the award for most spirited player from former Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the award’s namesake.

The CWSG isn’t only about bipartisanship on and off the field.

Since the game was started by a bipartisan group of female lawmakers it has raised almost $5 million for cancer research. Every year, it surpasses previous years’ totals, an organizer told the Reporter.