Senator Lamar Alexander to Retire in 2020
Peter D'Abrosca
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A United States Senator from Tennessee will retire at the end of his term in 2020, according to a statement released Monday morning.
“I will not be a candidate for re-election to the United States Senate in 2020. The people of Tennessee have been very generous, electing me to serve more combined years as Governor and Senator than anyone else from our state,” Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) said in press release.
The 78-year-old Alexander is the chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, and has served in the Senate since 2003. He was Governor of Tennessee from 1979-1987.
“I am deeply grateful, but now it is time for someone else to have that privilege,” the release said. “I have gotten up every day thinking that I could help make our state and country a little better, and gone to bed most nights thinking that I have. I will continue to serve with that same spirit during the remaining two years of my term.”
Alexander, who spent more than 50 years in politics, quit Republican party leadership a few years ago in order to “get results,” which is D.C. code language for compromising with Democrats at the expense of conservatism.
In an interview with John Harwood in 2017, he bemoaned the lack of cooperation between parties.
“You know, if all I want to do is make a speech, or shout, I’d go to a street corner or buy a radio station. I want to get a result. And that’s harder to do today, because the extremes are polarizing,” he said.
The “results” referred to by Alexander almost always meant sacrificing conservative values. In fact, during the 50 years that Alexander was in office, conservatives failed to truly conserve anything. They lost on every social issue. They lost on small government, building the bloated bureaucracy that plagues us today. They lost on government spending, leading us to a $21 trillion national debt.
Most importantly, they lost touch with the ordinary, blue collar American. Make no mistake – Alexander is part of the generation that ruined government for and by the people.
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