The 81 one year senator has done 8 terms (will be 32 years) in the US Senate….
He IS a political powerhouse that sits on critical Senate committee’s….
Senate Appropriations Committee and the Judiciary and the Agriculture committees….
It appears Senator Bernie Sanders may have influence on his successor …
“It is time to pass the torch to the next Vermonter who will carry on this work for our great state. It’s time to come home,” Leahy said, speaking from the same room in Vermont’s State House where he launched his first Senate campaign in 1974.
Leahy, 81, has served eight terms in the upper chamber. He is currently the president pro tempore of the Senate, the second highest ranking position in the chamber. He also serves as chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee and sits on the Judiciary and the Agriculture committees.
The senator notably presided over former President Trump‘s impeachment trial earlier this year.
Leahy is the only Democrat from Vermont that has been elected to the Senate.
The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) released a statement on Monday calling Leahy a “lion of the Senate.”
“Vermont is a blue state that has not elected a Republican to statewide federal office in more than 20 years, and Democrats look forward to winning this Senate seat in 2022,” said Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.), the chairman of the DSCC.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who is the longest-serving Republican senator, issued bipartisan praise for Leahy following news of his retirement….
image…Vox
Democratic Socialist Dave says
8 x 6 = 48 [= 2023 – 1975], James, not 32.
jamesb says
According to the NY Times
The current Dem majority is 5 seats
Only 14 states have maps the piece points out
jamesb says
In addition
There WILL BE Court challenge’s
And Biden’s numbers could help
I’m talking about the current situation,…
This is speculative
But Yea
Democrats ARE in deep political shit and Biden is NOT helping things
jamesb says
The drip, drip, drip of Democratic retirements …
On Monday, Vermont Democratic Sen. Patrick Leahy announced that he would leave Congress when his eighth term expires at the end of 2022.
On Tuesday, California Democratic Rep. Jackie Speier said she would retire next year after almost 15 years in Congress.
Neither seat should be a problem for Democrats to hold. Vermont went for President Joe Biden by 35 points in 2020 — his largest margin anywhere in the country. And Speier’s Bay Area 14th District gave Biden a whopping 89% of the vote last November.
The bigger issue for Democrats then is not keeping those seats on their side. It’s that a steady drumbeat of retirements from within their ranks ….
CNN Politics
Democratic Socialist Dave says
California Democratic Rep. Jackie Speier said Tuesday she would not seek reelection, the latest high-profile Democrat to announce plans to leave Congress as the party faces a steep climb to hold onto their narrow majority in the House in next year’s midterms.
Speier, who was first elected to her US House seat in 2008, has been one of Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s closest allies in Congress. Her departure follows a series of recent announcements from Democrats making public their plans to leave Capitol Hill including Reps. John Yarmuth of Kentucky, David Price of North Carolina and Mike Doyle of Pennsylvania.
Speier is the 15th Democrat in the House to announce their intention to leave at the end of the term, compared to 10 Republicans. At this point in the 2020 cycle, 20 Republicans and eight Democrats were on track to leave the chamber at the end of the term.
Pelosi called Speier an “extraordinary Member of Congress and a significant leader” and said that it “has been my personal honor to share representation of San Francisco with her.”
“Her courageous and values-based leadership, particularly on behalf of the women, survivors and the vulnerable, has made a difference in the lives of countless Americans and has strengthened our nation,” Pelosi said in a statement.
Prior to serving in Congress, Speier, who is 71, survived the Jonestown massacre in 1978, where more than 900 people died in a mass murder-suicide. At the time, Speier was a congressional staffer for then-Rep. Leo J. Ryan. Speier was shot five times on a remote airstrip in Guyana, South America in an attack that also left the congressman and four others dead as they tried to escape, an experience she highlighted in her retirement announcement.
“Forty-three years ago this week, I was lying on an airstrip in the jungles of Guyuna with five bullet holes in my body,” Speier said in a video announcing her decision posted to her Twitter account. “I vowed that if I survived, I would dedicate my live to public service.”…
— By Annie Grayer and Ethan Cohen, CNN
Updated 7:45 PM ET, Tue November 16, 2021
https://www.cnn.com/2021/11/16/politics/jackie-speier-not-running-for-reelection/index.html