Some of our readers are disputing that Michele Bachmann “retired” from running for office, but however you describe it, she’s not running for the congressional seat she has been in for several terms.
And it looks like her main competitor — whose election was made more not less difficult by Bachmann’s retirement — is “retiring” also, With Bachmann not running, Jim Graves pulls out of 6th District race:
As of today, Jim Graves is going to indefinitely suspend his campaign for Congress from the 6th District.
Translation: He is not running. He is dropping out of politics to concentrate on his family and his business….
Graves kindly reached out to me Thursday night to offer a brief interview and agreed that MinnPost could break the story this morning, a short time before his official statement is released. Here is what he told me:
‘Mission Accomplished’
“Basically, after all that’s gone on, and with Michele Bachmann now stepping down, I’ve been talking to my friends and family and frankly, the feeling is, ‘Mission Accomplished.’ She wasn’t representing the people of the 6th District appropriately, and now she won’t be representing them. There’s no way anyone could run and win who would be worse than Michele Bachmann. So we accomplished that task.”
Looks like Bachmann was pretty savvy.
She goes out a winner, preserves her political future, and keeps a Republican congressional seat in a solid Republican district likely in the Republican column.
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Comments
We’ll see if it actually stays republican. I don’t trust the opposition.
Agreed ironghost; with the additional note that I also do not trust the Institutional Republicans. I can see them trying to run a Lindsey Graham-clone, and turning the seat over voluntarily.
Subotai Bahadur
The Cook political report says that it is pretty solidly Republican. Romney had it by +15 (I think, I don’t have the numbers in front of me) even though he lost the state. Rep. Bachmann actually under-performed there.
I don’t see that Ms. Bachmann has much of an elected political future. She crashed and burned in the 2012 primaries, she can’t win state-wide office in Minnesota, and a 2014 run for her seat was going to be difficult, with or without Mr. Graves hounding her. I think that is what drove this: she spent $14 million and won the seat by 3 points, had a tough race coming up yet again, and had a sense that perhaps her constituents were getting a little tired of her.
I think she’s headed for a think tank.
The key concern now is that the local Pubs might put up a Squish for the seat. A renewed Tea Party needs to keep an eye on this one.
Bachmann sure brought out the crazy in people, particularly the sexists:
http://www.womenwintoo.blogspot.com/2013/05/a-few-comments-on-michelle-bachmann.html
Did she not state that 8 years was enough? What mission did the douche accomplish? Other than looking like another in a long line of ignorant self serving turds?
Michelle Bachmann has a Masters in taxation law from William & Mary.plus significant employment in the field plus state & federal rep history.
She is the perfect person to head a body that has miles & miles of targets to pick off in the IRS & Beyond.
They have not heated the last of Michele.
heard the last …..
As any donor to her campaign knows – she is a pitbull when it comes to funds.
It is simply incredible to assert that a four-term incumbent declining to run for reelection when victory is in serious doubt is doing anything positive to preserve her “political future.” She is avoiding embarrassment, and preserving the money in her campaign accounts, that’s all.
Her political future was etched in stone in Iowa in 2012, and the inscription reads, “Nowhere, fast.”
Bachmann has no strong political or personal connections to anyone who might offer her appointive office, and the idea that someone else – be it Walter, Paul, Jindal, or any other potential GOP President – might appoint her to IRS or anything more important than Ambassador to Sierra Leone is fantastic.
WALKER, not “Walter”
Maybe she will replace Muslim f***** Norquisling.
Bet there’s a plan afoot. :8->
As someone who could not stand this woman pre-2008, until 2008 and onward, I will forever be in awe of this woman and other conservative women like Palin.
I so hope Bachmann runs against that clown Al Franken, I will work overtime so I can donate more to Bachmann.