Why Are So Many Democrats Dying To Stay In Congress?

It's like an addiction.

House Republicans passed Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” on Thursday, which will put a buzz saw to Medicaid, Medicare, and food assistance programs, for a start, while giving tax breaks to the wealthiest Americans. The lumbering, hideous bill passed by just one vote — 215 to 214, with two Republicans voting against the bill because it wasn’t quite evil enough. Aiding and abetting Trump and Speaker Mike Johnson’s victory was the absence of three House Democrats who all died within the past six months.

Sylvester Turner, a 70-year-old freshman representative from Texas’s 18th congressional district, died two months after he was sworn into Congress. He replaced the late Rep. Shirley Jackson Lee, who died last July. Turner was diagnosed with a rare type of bone cancer in November 2022.

Raúl Grijalva died from lung cancer in March at the age of 77. He announced his diagnosis in April 2024 but still ran for re-election in Arizona’s 7th congressional district, stating that he would step down in 2026 because of his cancer treatment. It’s probably a good idea to retire at 78 even when you don’t have cancer.

Gerry Connolly from Virginia’s 11th congressional district died last week at 75. He announced that he had esophageal cancer just a couple days after the November election, yet he still ran for ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, a position he held until his death.

One House Democrat told Axios after the MAGA bill passed, “You see where we are, we can’t afford to lose anymore members. ... We’re down three people because they passed away.” However, this isn’t the result of some vengeful curse from a Stephen King novel. These are all tragic, yet foreseeable deaths.

Another Democratic House member stated the obvious: “The tragic reality is, when ... this vote passes and the difference is the number of members who passed away this Congress, I think it’s going to really infuriate many of our supporters.”

If Only Democrats Were In Disarray

---

---

It’s impossible to say whether Republican holdouts Thomas Massie, Warren Davidson, and Andy Harris, who voted “present,” would have still withheld support if they didn’t believe the bill could prevail without them. However, when fighting MAGA fascism, Democrats shouldn’t make it any easier for Republicans. They should at least force every member of their narrow majority to take difficult votes or at least stay awake. Republican Rep. Andrew Garbarino fell asleep and missed the vote, but at least he’s still alive.

Turner, Grijalva, and Connolly all held seats in districts that Democrats can win with North Korea-level margins. Kamala Harris carried Turner’s district 69 to 29 percent; Grijalva’s district 69 to 29 percent, and Connolly’s 65 to 35 percent. The recently deceased Democrats weren’t holding the breach for liberalism in a rural district that has steadily shifted to the right over the past 30 years. Whatever institutional knowledge Grijalva and Connolly might’ve possessed matters less than simply showing up for critical votes.

Republicans have gleefully leveraged these deaths. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has scheduled the election for Turner’s seat for November 4, denying the mostly Democratic members of that district congressional representation for a full year. Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin decides when a special election is held to replace Connolly and it’s doubtful he’ll feel motivated to accelerate the process. The likely earliest date is in August or September.

Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs scheduled the special election for Grijalva’s seat for September 23 with a primary on July 15. (She’s a Democrat, so apparently that’s the best she can do.) The irony here is that no Republican stands a chance in the special election. The primary will determine who’s actually replacing Grijalva, but that person won’t be seated in Congress until early October.

It’s not ageist or any other “ist” to point out that there are very real consequences when elected officials die in office, especially House members whose seats can’t be filled by an appointment. Eight members of Congress have died in office since November 2022, and they were all Democrats with an average age of 75.

Working until you literally die is perhaps one of the hidden benefits of the new GOP bill, but it’s not something you’d think liberals would promote.

Democrats Need Primaries, Maybe Even Gladiatorial Combat

A Democratic addiction to Congress

A disturbing number of Democrats are seemingly addicted to Congress. Axios reports that of the 30 House Democrats who are 75 or older, more than half plan to run again in 2026.

That includes Reps. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), 86; Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), 82; John Garamendi (D-Calif.), 80; Doris Matsui (D-Calif.), 80; Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-N.J.), 80; Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas), 78; Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio), 78; Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), 77; Al Green (D-Texas), 77 and Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), 77.

Reps. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), 77; Kweisi Mfume (D-Md.), 76; Richard Neal (D-Mass.), 76; Lois Frankel (D-Fla.), 76; Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.), 75 and Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio), 75, are also on the list.

Rep. Jim Clyburn from South Carolina turns 85 in July and is currently serving his 17th term in the House. Yet he has no immediate plans to retire, at least voluntarily. When The Wall Street Journal asked him about leaving Congress, Clyburn reportedly said, “What do you want— me to give up my life?” During a later interview with Roland Martin, he denied saying this, presumably because it’s so pathetic, but his response was even worse: “Do you want me to commit suicide?”

I confess I might share Clyburn’s sentiments if I’d gotten my desired 1990s job as Jane Seymour’s personal masseuse, but this is Congress. Join a volunteer board, travel, or just sit on the porch with a cool drink. Most Americans work to live. They don’t live to work. Their representatives should consider sharing those values.

Many longtime House Democrats have admitted they are sticking around because they hope that the party will regain control of the House in the midterms, and there are obvious advantages to serving in the majority, specifically in committee leadership. That is a major contrast to the GOP, which imposes term limits on committee leaders while Democrats still base power in seniority.

When Republicans took over the House in 1994, Speaker Newt Gingrich enforced a six-year term limit for committee chairs. This was intended to rein in the power of individual chairs, arguably for Gingrich’s benefit, but it did have the long term impact of encouraging former chairs to retire when their terms were up.

Call me callous but I don’t mind that much if elderly Republicans keel over and miss votes for their own terrible bills. However, given the current stakes, we need the Democratic Party at full strength. Imagine if Democrats do regain the majority next year, but a few sudden, yet hardly surprising deaths, returns the speaker’s gavel to Mike Johnson. The fact that such a scenario is actually plausible is both disturbing and absurd. We shouldn’t primary Congress members just because of their age, but it’s frankly sad that so many don’t know when to leave the stage.