I’ll admit it, I’m a big EJ Dionne fan. I have yet so see him make a silly or impertinent comment, or make an off the wall guess on any panel show I have seen him on, and his columns regularly knock it out of the park. So it really shouldn’t be too surprising that he has once again given us something to keep an eye on between now and the midterms.
Katy Tur was in for Steve Kornacki yesterday in the 1-2 PM PDT time slot. In her last segment, she had EJ Dionne and another panel member (don’t recall the name) on to discuss a few things. The last thing they discussed was the sudden announcement by Jason Chaffetz that he was not going to run for reelection. It was during his turn to speak that EJ said something to remember down the road.
To paraphrase since there is no video I could find, he stated that the fact is that a lot of politicians who are used to being reelected in comfortable landslides really don’t much like having to run in tight, competitive races. First, they have to raise more cash, and second, they tend to have to answer questions they’d really rather let lie fallow. Tight races kind of tend to dent their persona of invincibility.
This will bear thinking of again over the coming months. Trump is already inducing panic attacks in some GOP office holders. Bob Corker R-TN has yet to announce whether or not he’ll run for reelection next year. Trump may have helped chop 20 points off of the KS special election a few weeks ago, as well as almost getting a Democrat into GA-6 without a runoff. And it looks like it’s only going to get worse.
Jason Chaffetz is young, he’s got a future. But he doesn’t have Hillary to investigate anymore, and he’s catching more and more shit for his lack of enthusiasm for investigating his boss, or anybody else with a R after their name. Why bother to risk his invincible reputation with a stunning upset in 2018, or even a squeaker victory that exposes him as weak. Orrin Hatch is going to retire sooner or later, and besides, the Governors seat is going to be empty in a couple of years as well. Why not keep his powder dry?
He is not the only one who is going to think seriously about this if Trump continues to be ballast instead of a helium balloon. This consideration will be most prevalent in younger candidates, with futures and ambitions, and older candidates, who want to go out on top, not as has been, also rans in their last campaign. They want a legacy, not an asterisk.
Keep an eye on this over the next 6-10 months, just keep it in the back of your mind. If you start to see more and more incumbents, especially long serving incumbents or up and coming start with prospects announcing their retirement, or declining to defend their seat, that could be as big of an indicator, or even more so than incumbents publicly breaking with or criticizing Trump that they see an upcoming disaster in the midterms. This is starting to get very interesting.