With the Capitol dome gleaming in the distance, leaders and supporters of Agudath Israel of America, elected officials and distinguished guests gathered Tuesday evening on the rooftop of the historic Hall of the States building to mark the retirement of its longtime Washington director, Rabbi Abba Cohen, and inaugurate the organization’s new home in the nation’s capital.

The occasion drew a remarkable cross-section of power: Republican and Democratic lawmakers, senior Trump administration officials, and a who’s who of the Orthodox Jewish communal world — all united in tribute to a man who has spent nearly four decades navigating the corridors of Congress with quiet tenacity. Gourmet steaks and elaborate desserts accompanied the warm atmosphere, but the real menu of the evening was 38 years of accomplishments.

Agudath Israel Board Chairman Shlomo Werdiger set the tone early, sketching the arc of Rabbi Cohen’s tenure since the organization opened its first full-time Orthodox Jewish advocacy office in Washington in 1988. “Thirty-eight years ago, you were entrusted to safeguard the name of our organization on Capitol Hill,” Werdiger told Rabbi Cohen, “and now you’ve returned it to us in the purest form as you received it.”

The catalogue of legislative wins Werdiger cited was extensive: early child-care voucher legislation, a foundational role in passage of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, creation of the Nonprofit Security Grant program — which has channeled over $2 billion to Jewish and other faith communities — and the ongoing fight for equitable services for nonpublic schools.

The breadth of that work was illustrated by one anecdote shared at the event: around 2004, Rabbi Cohen was simultaneously juggling calls with American elected officials and Egyptian government officials, working to lift an embargo on lulavim so that a supply could reach Jewish communities in time for Sukkos. It was the kind of urgent, behind-the-scenes scramble that rarely makes headlines — and that defined his career.

Harav Yissocher Frand, Rosh Yeshiva of Ner Yisroel, who has known Rabbi Cohen for 50 years — since a hashgacha protis encounter at a Washington bus station on July 4, 1976, during the Bicentennial celebration — delivered a tribute that drew on the image of the spies Yehoshua sent to scout Eretz Yisroel, who, according to one explanation in Rashi, were instructed to disguise themselves as merchants of earthenware utensils. Those vessels had no worth in themselves; their value was purely functional. Rav Frand held up that metaphor as the defining portrait of Rabbi Cohen’s service. “It was never about him, it was never about his reputation, it was never about advancement,” Rav Frand said, contrasting Rabbi Cohen to typical politicians on Capitol Hill. “It’s all about the mission. And if I may say, that is a rare commodity in this city.”

Rabbi Avi Schnall, Agudah’s New Jersey director and COO, said the most valuable thing passing with Rabbi Cohen’s retirement wasn’t any legislative achievement. “It’s the advice, it’s the guidance, it’s the counsel that all of us relied upon,” he said.

Schnall later announced with great fanfare that Rabbi A.D. Motzen, National Director of Government Affairs, would serve as the incoming director of the Washington office.

Rabbi Chaim Dovid Zweibel, Executive Vice President of Agudah, presented Rabbi Cohen with a large commemorative letter of appreciation signed by the Moetzes Gedolei Hatorah.

Martin Marks, the White House’s Jewish engagement special assistant to the president, described how he and his colleagues routinely turned to Agudah whenever a policy question arose, saying the quiet advocacy made a world of difference. He also noted that White House Faith Office Director Jenny Korn, who worked with Rabbi Cohen during the first Trump administration, had told him just that morning how much she valued that relationship.

The legislative voices in the room were no less forceful. Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) ticked through his recent record — passage of private school scholarship tax deductions, expanded nonprofit security grant funding, and bipartisan legislation with Rep. Josh Gottheimer to enshrine the IHRA definition of antisemitism in federal civil rights enforcement. “You cannot tackle this if you are unwilling to call it out wherever it rears its ugly head,” Lawler said, naming figures from across the political spectrum.

Harmeet Dhillon, assistant attorney general for civil rights, described a sweeping federal push against antisemitism that has included roughly $500 million in settlements with leading universities, landmark lawsuits against UCLA and Harvard, criminal and civil enforcement under the FACE Act targeting attacks on synagogues, and a series of RLUIPA cases challenging zoning discrimination against Jewish communities in the Northeast.

“Columbia is the signature one that I’m proud of — $200 million penalty, largely for their antisemitic conduct in the wake of October 7,” Dhillon said, while holding what Rabbi AD Motzen described as a “fireside chat without a fire” with the incoming head of the Washington office. She added that she is the friendliest administration in certainly her lifetime and urged community members to come forward with complaints, disclosing that charges in a new hate crime case are expected within weeks.

Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) opened with a wry observation: “My job, I often think, as a non-Jew, is to make Jews feel guilty for not knowing the Torah as well as I do.” The senator, who has studied Torah weekly for over 30 years, invoked the parsha of the meraglim — with Calev and Yehoshua as models of courage against seemingly impossible odds — and drew a direct line to Rabbi Cohen’s career. “Thank you for being in the tradition of courageous Jewish Americans,” Booker said. “For being in the tradition of Joshua and Caleb.”

Rep. Randy Fine (R-FL) disclosed that just the night before, while walking alone near Pennsylvania Avenue, he had been targeted in an antisemitic attack. Fine recounted that a man on a bicycle rode past, recognized him, and hurled a vicious antisemitic epithet. Fine called out after him rather than keep walking. The man turned his bicycle around and rode it directly at Fine — making the first physical move. Fine said the confrontation ended with his attacker on the sidewalk.

Fine also recounted his decision to begin wearing a kippah on the House floor — a first in the chamber’s 249-year history. The decision came at the urging of his 18-year-old son, who told him: “Dad, I want you to wear a yarmulke, because I have friends that go to college who don’t feel safe wearing theirs.” The gesture was cemented when an Orthodox family in the visitors’ gallery spotted him presiding, their young children pointing in recognition. “They saw someone that looked like them,” Fine said.

His bill, the PEACE Act, which would hold European nations accountable for the surge in antisemitism on their soil, passed the House floor this week.

The evening closed as it opened — with the Capitol as backdrop and a sense that the work is far from done. “The challenges are only getting stronger,” Werdiger said. “But our presence to meet those challenges will be even greater.”

For Agudath Israel, the new Hall of the States office is more than a real estate upgrade. It is, as Werdiger put it, a statement of permanence — a declaration that Orthodox Jewry’s voice in the capital is here to stay.