Former Acting House Speaker Patrick McHenry will on Tuesday announce he’s calling it quits and will not run for reelection in 2024 after serving out this term, Politico’s Olivia Beavers reports.
The pace of drop-outs in odd-numbered years is typically a barometer of how a caucus feels about how the next election is going to go: In 2017 and 2019 there were fairly large exoduses of Republicans while 2022 saw more Dems, but not nearly as many, do the same. Per Ballotpedia the current pace is at 20 Dems and ten Republicans (adding McHenry to Ballotpedia’s total). That measure isn’t all that great however and it’s more instructive to look a little deeper at it. Nine of those Dems but only two of the Republicans are running for the Senate. Eight Dems and seven Republicans are retiring outright, plus that Dean Phillips dipshit who might as well be retiring and…
Too much to sort out when the real point is that it’s more even than it looks at first glance. This also doesn’t include weakling former Speaker Kevin McCarthy, who is reportedly on the ledge of not just declining to seek reelection, but quitting altogether and leaving town any day now.