As it turns out, some people who never harbored ambitions to be career politicians don’t love being politicians.
“I think, for many of us in my class, it truly wasn’t on the bucket list of life to be here. It wasn’t as if I was a junior in high school saying, ‘I want to be a member of Congress,'” Rigell says.
Twenty one members of his class have already left, although two of them now serve in the Senate: Sen. Cory Gardner of Colorado and Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina. Three more House Republicans are running for the Senate this year.
Another eight members of the class are retiring. The retiring lawmakers include a farmer, a decorated Army veteran and a construction company owner.
“I’ve had better jobs than this,” retiring Rep. Dan Benishek, R-Mich., says with a chuckle, “It’s amazing to me how people are like, ‘Oh, I’ve got to run for Congress. That’s going to be the best.’ I don’t know. I never really felt that way.”
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