The bad news: This is the 35th House retirement or resignation by Republicans since the start of the congressional term last January. By comparison, just 16 Democrats are on their way out. The good news: Most of the GOPers leaving Washington hail from safely red districts — so far.
The bad news in the good news: Number 35, Ed Royce, isn’t one of them.
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Reporters have been asking Royce for months if he’s running for reelection. Yep yep yep, Royce told them — and then today, suddenly, nope. November will be a tough month for Republicans nationally; for an endangered species like Royce, a California Republican from a purple district, it may have been unsurvivable. Romney won his district narrowly against Obama in 2012 but Hillary won it easily in 2016, topping Trump by nine points. Royce was probably the party’s only chance of holding the seat, and even that was no sure thing. Without him, CA-39 likely turns blue.
Now, to the precinct maps! Despite Clinton winning #CA39 by 9%, Rep. Royce was reelected by 14%. Not surprisingly, Royce ran ahead of Trump basically everywhere: pic.twitter.com/BJGjrRLFhV
— J. Miles Coleman (@JMilesColeman) January 7, 2018
He had plenty of money in the bank, plus 25 years of incumbency anda plum job leading the House Foreign Relations Committee. Why wouldn’t a man in that position want to roll the dice on reelection? Simple: He’s term-limited as committee chair. As noted in the excerpt, this is his last year in charge and there’s nothing he can do about it. Years ago the GOP imposed six-year caps on committee chairmanships, which is a good way to give younger members a shot at leadership but a bad way to give older members an incentive to run for reelection in tough environments. Royce is the seventh committee chairman in the House to announce his resignation this year; faced with the prospect of running an uphill race in November and winning, only to return to the House as a backbencher instead of his committee’s head honcho, he decided to pack it in.
AAN Staff
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