Members of Congress are fleeing the job at a historically high rate

Some feel they’ve hit an appropriate retirement age. Others want to tend to their health or their families. Yet more are leaving because they don’t like the workplace.

Add it all together, and members of Congress are heading for the exit at a historically high rate ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, with two more House Republicans adding themselves to a growing roster just last week.

Rep. Barry Loudermilk, R-Ga., announced Wednesday that he was retiring from Congress, while Rep. Mark Amodei, R-Nev., announced Friday that he wouldn’t run for re-election, either. Loudermilk said he wants “to spend more dedicated time with my family,” while Amodei said it was “the right time for Nevada and myself to pass the torch.”

The latest retirements mean 60 members of Congress have decided not to run for re-election this year — 51 House members and nine senators. It’s the most retirements from both chambers combined this century, according to historical data from the Brookings Institution’s Vital Statistics on Congress. That includes lawmakers who are retiring from political life altogether and those leaving their seats to run for other offices, but it doesn’t include members who have resigned or died during the current Congress.

The number of House departures is inching closer to a recent high in 2018, when 52 lawmakers didn’t run for re-election. And, as in 2018, which was a bruising election year for the GOP, more House Republicans are heading for the exits than Democrats.

Lawmakers can choose to retire for a variety of reasons, including the personal — health issues or long commutes to Washington infringing on time with family — and the political, from chasing opportunities to run for higher offices to weighing the unappealing prospect of being relegated to the minority. And on top of it all, Congress can simply be a frustrating place to work.

Democratic Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi is one of more than two dozen members leaving the House chamber to run for higher office, as he’s running for the open Senate seat in Illinois.

“The chance to be in a body that would, for instance, be able to hold the president accountable, with regard to Supreme Court justices, continue to pursue my agenda with regard to making the American dream possible for people who feel like it’s slipping out of reach right now, making staple items more affordable, it’s too hard to pass up,” Krishnamoorthi recently told NBC News. “So I’m seeking a promotion.”

Asked why so many of his colleagues are retiring, Krishnamoorthi noted that the political arena hasn’t exactly been a pleasant place to be in recent years.

“Over my 10 years here, I think Donald Trump has helped catalyze a real toxic partisan atmosphere,” he said, later adding, “I have not known normal. And I think for anybody who came here expecting something different and then being served up this kind of toxic brew of partisanship and character attacks and name-calling is going to be severely disappointed.”

Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman, D-N.J., who is 81 years old, said in a recent interview just off the House floor that she is retiring because she felt “it was time that I needed to step aside, let someone else do this.”

Though she believes Democrats will take back the House in the fall, Watson Coleman said she couldn’t stand the idea of another two years of serving with Trump in the White House.

“I still would have had Donald Trump as a president,” she said. “And I tell you, that’s just sickening for me to have to deal with.”

Heading for the exits

Congressional retirements can provide some clues about where lawmakers think the political winds may be blowing in the upcoming midterm elections.

“It can tell us something about members in the majority, their expectations about whether they’re still going to be in the majority in the next cycle,” said Molly Reynolds, vice president and director of Governance Studies at Brookings.

In the 2018 election cycle, for example, a record 34 Republicans opted not to run for re-election to the House. Republicans went on to lose 40 seats and control of the chamber.

The 2026 midterms could also be a tough year for Republicans as they defend a razor-thin majority in the House, with Democrats looking to net just three seats to take control.

So far, 30 House Republicans are retiring, compared with 21 Democrats. The Senate is more evenly divided, with five Republicans and four Democrats retiring, as Democrats face an uphill battle to net the four seats they need for control. The Senate figure also doesn’t include a handful of members who are running for other offices but aren’t up for re-election this year, like Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., and Michael Bennet, D-Colo.

A Republican strategist dismissed the notion that retirements signaled a difficult environment for the GOP, noting that a majority of retiring Republicans are running for higher office. Several are running for governor or the Senate, including some in competitive states like Wisconsin and Arizona.

Gubernatorial term limits or retirements have also created a slew of open races for governor across the country, which are prime opportunities for members of Congress looking to become chief executives instead of just one in a body of hundreds.

“I just felt like they needed somebody with my business background to make business decisions for a state that’s getting ready to have an influx of people,” GOP Rep. Ralph Norman said of his decision to run for governor in South Carolina. He noted that he also supports term limits.

For other lawmakers, Congress can just be a frustrating place to work, as narrow majorities and yawning partisan divides make for persistent gridlock.

“I think that that does play a role,” said Sarah Chamberlain, president and CEO of the Republican Main Street Partnership, which includes around 100 GOP lawmakers. “I think that the gridlock is because the numbers are so tight.”

“It is a tough place to be,” Chamberlain said. “Security is another thing with their families at home and, you know, death threats and all of that, so that’s played into a piece of it.”

That was a factor for Rep. Jared Golden, D-Maine, who decided not to run for re-election in his competitive House seat.

“As a father, I have to consider whether the good I can achieve outweighs everything my family endures as a result,” Golden wrote in a Bangor Daily News op-ed, noting he and his family spent a recent Thanksgiving in a hotel after his home was threatened.

Midterm implications

Golden is one of the handful of lawmakers whose retirements have implications for the 2026 elections. But he told NBC News that while people expressed “their misgivings or regrets,” he didn’t face much pressure to change his mind, saying he is known as someone who is set in his decision once he makes it.

Just eight of the 51 retiring House members — five Republicans and three Democrats — represent districts that could be competitive in November. Along with Golden, Democratic Reps. Angie Craig of Minnesota and Chris Pappas of New Hampshire are vacating potentially competitive districts as they run for their states’ open Senate seats.

For House Republicans, the decisions of David Schweikert of Arizona and John James of Michigan to run for governor and the decisions of Ashley Hinson of Iowa and Andy Barr of Kentucky to run for the Senate are opening up their competitive House seats.

GOP Rep. Don Bacon’s decision to retire is likely to have dealt the biggest blow to House Republicans, as Bacon has consistently won re-election in a Democratic-leaning district in Nebraska.

Bacon said the grueling two-year election cycle played a role in his decision not to run for re-election.

“This job requires a 14-hour day during the week, Saturdays, parades and a variety of things, and Sunday sometimes. And do I want to do this for two more years? I just didn’t have the hunger to want to work at that intensity level,” Bacon told NBC News last year after he announced his retirement, though he didn’t rule out future campaigns for political office.

Bacon was confident that he could have won re-election had he run again. Democrats, though, believe GOP retirements are a sign that Republicans believe they have a tough election year ahead.

“House Republicans know they will lose the majority in November, and to spare themselves the embarrassment of voters rejecting them at the polls, an extraordinary number of vulnerable Republicans are just quitting, creating prime pick-up opportunities for Democrats,” said Viet Shelton, a spokesperson for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

But Republicans noted that most open House seats aren’t in competitive districts.

“Democrats are excited about retirements in districts they can’t win,” National Republican Congressional Committee spokesman Mike Marinella said. “House Republicans are on offense and we’re expanding the battlefield.”

Retirements have opened up competitive Senate seats, which can be difficult for the incumbent’s party because sitting senators are often better known and have stronger fundraising operations.

Democrats are defending open seats in Michigan, Minnesota and New Hampshire, where Sens. Gary Peters, Tina Smith and Jeanne Shaheen are retiring. And Republicans are defending open seats in North Carolina, where Sen. Thom Tillis isn’t seeking re-election, and Iowa, where Sen. Joni Ernst is retiring.

But the fact that most House retirements have come from lawmakers in safely Democratic or Republican seats underscores the intraparty conflicts on both sides, as primaries against incumbents pop up across the country.

Democrats in particular have been grappling with a base clamoring for new leadership after President Joe Biden bowed out of the 2024 race and Vice President Kamala Harris lost to Trump. Some of Congress’ oldest lawmakers are still running for re-election, but a number of longtime House members — including top Democrats like former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California and Steny Hoyer of Maryland — decided to step aside.

“I suspect that at least some of that is coming from the general pressure on the Democratic side of the aisle, from some elements of the Democratic base, for some amount of turnover and just more younger voices in the party,” said Reynolds of Brookings.

Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., invoked Biden when he revealed his decision to retire to The New York Times.

“Watching the Biden thing really said something about the necessity for generational change in the party, and I think I want to respect that,” Nadler said.