Congressional Resignations - Retirements, updated

I last posted a list of the Congressional resignations and retirements on December 8, 2007 and there are three more Congresspersons who have bailed out since then. So I am updating the list, and also adding the difference in the 2004 Presidential vote as a final column to show what the Democratic vs. Republican tendency is for each District or State.

I am also correcting an error in the earlier list. I had listed Michael R. McNulty of New York's 21st congressional district as a Republican. I sincerely apologize for insulting a good Democrat.

Each list is sorted first by party, then alphabetically by last name.

House

1	Allen, Tom	D	ME-01	Run for Senate	D+12
2	Carson, Julia	D	IN-07	Died	D+16
3	McNulty, Michael R	D	NY-21	Retire	D+13
4	Udall, Tom	D	NM-03	Run for Senate	D+9
5	Udal, Mark	D	CO-02	Run for Senate	D+17
6	Cubin, Barbara	R	WY-At lg	Retire	R+40
7	Davis, Jo Ann	R	VA-01	Died	R+21
8	Dolittle, John	R	CA-04	Retire	R+24
9	Everett, Terry	R	AL-02	Retire	R+34
10	Ferguson, Mike	R	NJ-07	Retire	R+6
11	Gilmore, Paul	R	OH-05	Died	R+22
12	Hastert, Dennis	R	IL-14	Resigned	R+11
13	Hobson, Dave	R	OH-07	Retire	R+14
14	Hunter, Duncan	R	CA-52	Retire	R+23
15	LaHood, Ray	R	IL-18	Retire	R+16
16	McCrery, Jim	R	LA-04	Retire	R+19
17	Pickering, Chip	R	MS-03	Retire	R+31
18	Pryce, Deborah	R	OH-15	Retire	D+0 *
19	Ramstad, Jim	R	MN-03	Retire	R+3 *
20	Regula, Ralph	R	OH-16	Retire	R+8
21	Renzi, Rick	R	AZ-01	Retire	R+8
22	Saxton, Jim	R	NJ-03	Retire	R+2 *
23	Tancredo, Tom	R	CO-06	Retire	R+21
24	Walsh, Jim	R	NY-25	Retire	R+2 *
25	Weldon, Dave	R	FL-15	Retire	R+14
26	Weller, Jerry	R	IL-11	Retire	R+7
27	Wilson, Heather	R	NM-01	Run for Senate	R+3

Senate

1	Allard, Wayne	R	CO	Retiring	R+5 *
2	Craig, Larry	R	ID	Retiring	R+38
3	Domenici, Pete	R	NM	Retiring	R+1 *
4	Hagel, Chuck	R	NB	Retiring	R+33
5	Lott, Trent	R	MS	Resigning	R+19
6	Warner, John	R	VA	Retiring	R+9

"Retiring" means serving to end of term. Will not run for reelection.
"Resigning" means announced resignation and intends to leave before end of term.
"Resigned" means has already officially left office during this term.
"At Lg" means the only congress person in the state.

The final column reflects the Presidential vote in 2004. D+13 means Kerry received 13% more of the vote than Bush did. Districts or states in which the difference was 5% or less are indicated by an asterisk (*) because they will be likely change, particularly if the winning presidential candidate has "coattails". Deborah Pryce's Ohio 15th district was effectively tie in the 2004 Presidential race, so it is shown as D+0. The score there is only an indicator and reflects political conditions three years ago, so while Virginia is listed a R+9, in 2006 Virginia elected Democrat Jim Webb as Senator so it is probably a tossup state.

In the House, 22 (10.9%) of the 202 Republicans have resigned, died, or announced they are not running for reelection. Of those 22, only Heather Wilson of New Mexico is running for higher office (the Senate in her case.) The other 21 Congress people are leaving politics.

Of the 233 Democrats, 5 (2.1%) have announced that they are not running for reelection, and three are running for Senate seats. Tom Udall is running for the same New Mexico Senate seat that Heather Wilson is, so one of them is gone from Congress after November.

Clearly Republican turnover is much higher than that of the Democrats, which suggests that the Republicans expect to remain in the minority after the 2008 election.

Bush and Gen Petreaus have greatly lowered American casualties in Iraq so that Iraq has moved out of the news. It will thus have less influence on the November 2008 election than expected unless something changes sharply. The Recession that is currently building will clearly have an effect, with voters being more likely to vote against incumbents and particularly Republicans. Because the Primaries have been moved to such early dates, the latest information on the coming Recession will not permit many intra-party challenges of incumbents. That's unfortunate, because there are a lot of Blue Dog Democrats who need to be challenged and removed from office.