Posted on 08/06/2019 6:47:39 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
So far, seven months into 2019, eight Republican representatives have announced retirement, six of them during the months of July and August 2019. By comparison, in 2018, 39 congressional Republicans (three U.S. senators and 23 members of the House of Representatives), together with 18 Democrats, did not run for re-election.
What is going on with all these Republican retirements?
One narrative has it that Republicans were retiring because they were fed up with the toxic political environment or were afraid of losing elections, but these narratives were prematurely formed or they lacked correlation. There actually are three possible hypotheses that explain, single or combined, this phenomenon:
-(a) Republicans fear losing the majority in their own chamber of the Congress,
-(b) Republicans prefer to avoid a tough re-election, and
-(c) Republicans are not aligned with the direction President Trump has imposed on the party.
According to a 2018 study, Republican retirees were slightly more moderate and less supportive of Trump than their colleagues who were on the ballot. The 2018 Republican retirements represented the fifth-biggest exodus of any party in any election since 1974. This situation was not thrilling for Republicans because losing incumbents makes it harder to hold a vacant seat.
Related to the 2018 retirements, the pattern of more competitive elections in Republican-held districts was more consistent. The partisan lean of the retirees’ districts was 15 percentage points more Republican-leaning than the national average, compared with 24 percentage points more for the other Republican incumbents. It seemed that many Republicans found retirement as more appealing than a tough re-election campaign.
Other factors included membership and committee term limits, scandal, age and the demands of the House speakership.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
They are being run out.
Compromised. Blackmail and extortion.
The RINOs are leaving? I Hope so. If so then F them all.
Being run out indeed. Corrupt and blackmailable Rinos need to go.
If these representatives are receiving vales or systematic threats to themselves or their families, who would they report that to? Is there an aparatus in place for this? The President has the secret service dedicated to his protection. I have a suspicion that ‘toxic political environment’ is a lot deeper than most people know.
“The RINOs are leaving?”
My initial thoughts exactly. Probably good riddance, there are so many Repubs not following The Prez’s and the will of the people who voted for him.
Reason a is invalid. Republicans prefer the minority, they can then heckle as back benchers while not taking any responsibility for actions of Congress.
Reason c is possible, but in general, Republicans have no spine, and lack conviction. As long as they can stay on the gravy train, politicians will be fine with whatever direction.
Reason b, we have a winner. Most politicians dislike hard work. Given the overt media bias, it is an uphill battle for most Republicans. So, why not retire and move on to K street?
K street. Bingo. I was thinking epstein connections.
I think it’s likely that Representatives realize life in the minority hugely sucks and they don’t think the odds of winning back the House in 2020 are that great.
Someone always comes up with that line. Prove it, just once.
Bush League Republicans trying to throw the House to the Democrats intentionally like they did in 2018 to try to save the Bush Plan for North Mexico (aka USA).
The Republicans will again win all the Seats of Retiring Republican Representatives.
Interesting article. Thanks for posting.
I wonder how many of those suddenly retiring have availed themselves of the congressional bimbo slush fund. Perhaps some of that will be coming out and these have seen the writing on the wall.
Republican Rino retirees: Send Them Back
... to their Communist China origins.
Democrats are death threating Republicans, who in the past supported gun control. They supported defenselessness, and are now being death threated.
Bingo!! Perhaps they know the crap will hit the ceiling and will be exposed.
“Corrupt and blackmailable Rinos need to go.”
Agreed. But there may be another reason for their baling...sick of being attacked at every place they go with no facts to back anything except a lying group of people creating attack dogs from the public.
I can remember being wheeled out of an aircraft coming from Vietnam and met with catcalls from people in 1968. It really effected my attitude about what we were doing for people that hated us because we did what was right at the time.
I had the opportunity in 1995 to take a embassy job in Germany and chose to retire instead because of the changes in the business and the thought process it had transformed into. I just didn’t want it anymore at that level as I wasn’t able to change things if they needed it. I believe it is the same with the GOP politicians. They are getting tired of being determined the “heavy” whether they did anything or not but were negatively marked by the existence of their Constitutional beliefs. This is what it is all about and falls under Alinsky’s rules for radicals:
RULE 5: “Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon.”
RULE 8: “Keep the pressure on. Never let up.”
RULE 10: “If you push a negative hard enough, it will push through and become a positive.”
RULE 12: “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.”
This is the playbook that has been used by the libs/socialists for half a century. It is published, understood, and used everyday some way. I can see where the GOP in congress and the senate can just say, “Enough is enough” and walk.
rwood
(d) Some change is coming that is going to make a lot of people in Congress look bad, so they’re getting out early.
I’ll bet many of these RINOs vote for the beast.
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