Eight GOP House lawmakers won’t seek reelection
WASHINGTON — House Republicans are suffering an early exodus ahead of next year’s elections, hampering their uphill prospects for recapturing control from Democrats as lawmakers chafe under life in the minority, today’s razoredged partisanship and the tweets and tantrums of President Trump.
Rep. Michael Conaway, RTexas, this week became the eighth Republican lawmaker to announce he won’t seek reelection, which the 71yearold attributed to his loss of a leadership role atop his beloved House Agriculture Committee. While Conaway’s central Texas district is safe Republican territory, the party’s overall departures are on pace to match the 34 who stepped aside before the last elections — the GOP’s biggest total since at least 1930.
Republicans say they don’t expect this year’s departures to reach that level, but their more ominous problem is the retirements of several more junior lawmakers. Their exits put perhaps three of their seats in play for 2020 and suggest an underlying unease within the party about the hard realities of remaining in Congress.
“There’s a mood of tremendous frustration with the lack of accomplishment,” said Rep. Paul Mitchell, RMich., after stunning colleagues when he said he’s leaving after just two House terms. “Why run around like a crazy man when the best you can hope is maybe you’ll see some change at the margins?”
Mitchell, 62, blamed leaders of both parties for using the nation’s problems “as a means to message for elections” instead of solving them.
He also expressed frustration with Trump’s tweets last month telling four Democratic congresswomen of color — including his Michigan colleague, Rep. Rashida Tlaib — to “go back” to their home countries, though all are American. The tweet was “below the behavior of leadership that will lead this country to a better place,” Mitchell said.
Republicans also say it can be demoralizing to be in the minority in the House, where the chamber’s rules give the majority party almost unfettered control.
But other Republicans — several speaking on condition of anonymity to avoid alienating colleagues — say the frustration runs deeper. They describe worries that they won’t win back the majority in 2020, which would mean two more years of legislative futility, and exasperation over Trump’s outbursts, including his racist tweets taunting the four Democratic women.