The ongoing GOP mass exodus is even larger than many may have realized. Nearly four out of every ten Republican Representatives who were in office the day Donald Trump was sworn in as president no longer are or have announced they no longer will be U.S. Congressmen or Congresswomen.
The Washington Post reports that in the almost three years since Trump took office, due to resignations, retirements, and election losses “nearly 40 percent of the 241 Republicans who were in office in January 2017 are gone or leaving.”
Calling the retirement numbers alone “particularly staggering,” the Post reports “41 House Republicans have left national politics or announced they won’t seek reelection” since Trump took office – and that does not include election losses.
16 of those 41 resignations and retirements are from this year alone. Two more resignations are to run for the Senate.
“That dwarfs the 25 Democrats who retired in the first four years of former president Barack Obama’s tenure — and Republicans privately predict this is only the beginning.”
Publicly many of these Republicans “cite family as the reason for leaving,” but privately they point to the direction Trump has taken the GOP, and their “pessimism” about retaking the House majority next year.
Read the entire report here.
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