Sen. Tina Smith (D-MN) announced she would not run for reelection in 2026 after 23 years in the chamber.
Smith took over when Al Franken resigned and won reelection in 2020 by five points.
Politico reported that failed Democrat VP candidate Gov. Tim Walz might run for her seat.
The information came from “a person close to the governor.” Politico “granted anonymity” to the person.
Walz’s office did not provide a comment.
Smith put out a video to explain her decision:
I wanted you to hear directly from me that I have decided not to run for reelection to the United States Senate in 2026. I have loved my job as United States senator and also after 20 years of hard and rewarding work in the public sector, I’m ready to spend more time with my family.You know, when I first came to the senate, I didn’t have any grandchildren, and now, Archie and I have four, and our sons, Sam and Mason, and daughters in law, Emily and Julia are now all living in Minneapolis so we can be together. My father is going to be turning 95 this summer, and I am blessed to have a large extended family of siblings and nieces and nephews, and one of my great joys is to know that I have time to spend more time with them, doing sleepovers and helping out from time to time when the kids need me.So this decision is not political. It is entirely personal.But it’s not lost on me that our country is in need of strong, progressive leadership right now, maybe more than ever. So there are two things on my mind about this. The first is that I have nearly two full years left in my Senate term, and I plan to use every single day, working as hard as I can to represent your interests in the United States Senate and make sure that your voices are heard. And also, since I don’t have to worry about running an election, a reelection campaign, I can focus entirely on this job right now. And second, we have a deep bench of political talent in Minnesota, a group of leaders that are more than ready to pick up the work and carry us forward. And I’m excited to make room for them to move forward.At the end of the day, what I’m going to miss most about this job is not the perks and certainly not all of the attention. It’s going to be that feeling that I have from all of you being invited into your living rooms to hear what is happening in your lives and what that’s really like for you. That has been an inspiration to me every single day that I’ve served so I’m grateful for that. And I’m going to spend the next two years figuring out how to thank you all.So thank you so much, Minnesota.
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