Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), the former House Speaker who never managed to wrangle control of a divided Republican caucus, has announced his retirement months after being unceremoniously ousted from the top job.
News broke Wednesday morning with an op-ed by McCarthy in the Wall Street Journal announcing he would be departing Congress at the end of the year.
“No matter the odds, or personal cost, we did the right thing. That may seem out of fashion in Washington these days, but delivering results for the American people is still celebrated across the country. It is in this spirit that I have decided to depart the House at the end of this year to serve America in new ways,” he wrote, a subtle jab at critics who derided his backroom deals with Democrats at the expense of conservative values.
“I go knowing I left it all on the field—as always, with a smile on my face. And looking back, I wouldn’t have had it any other way,” he closed, a line that doesn’t square with his recent shoving of a colleague who voted for his removal as Speaker.
Speculation about McCarthy’s future had been rampant for weeks among Washington insiders who knew that the California…
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