Leaving Office: The U.S. Senator’s Representation, Ideological Adoption, and Strategic Retirement

Abstract

This study focuses on the incumbent senator's ideological congruence causing strategic retirement in the United States. The extent of ideological congruence between a senator and her constituency can be interpreted as the degree of electoral vulnerability. Senators out of steps with constituents are more likely than those toeing the line with constituents' preferences to choose voluntary retirement over being risk losing the general election. This study finds that senators with legislative records of relatively ideological incongruence to their state ideology will be more likely to decide to retire strategically.

Democratic incumbent resilience in the post-1980 Senate

“…A related explanation might be that Democrats retire more readily than Republicans when endangered. There is some evidence that candidates choose retirement strategically (e.g., Choi, 2017; Highton, 2011; Carson, 2005), but little research that this decision is asymmetric by party. I analyzed the effect of seniority and state and candidate ideology on the likelihood of retirement, with results in Table 3.…”