After a decades-long political career, the Michigan congressman and brief seeker of the Republican presidential nomination is calling it quits.
McCotter issued an official statement, in his trademark intellectual style:
“Today I have resigned from the office of United States Representative for Michigan’s 11th Congressional District.
After nearly 26 years in elected office, this past nightmarish month and a half have, for the first time, severed the necessary harmony between the needs of my constituency and of my family. As this harmony is required to serve, its absence requires I leave.
The recent event’s totality of calumnies, indignities and deceits have weighed most heavily upon my family. Thus, acutely aware one cannot rebuild their hearth of home amongst the ruins of their U.S. House office, for the sake of my loved ones I must “strike another match, go start anew” by embracing the promotion back from public servant to sovereign citizen.
I do not leave for an existing job and face diminishing prospects (and am both unwilling and ill-suited to lobby), my priorities are twofold: find gainful employment to help provide for my family; and continue to assist, in any way they see fit, the Michigan Attorney General’s earnest and thorough investigation, which I requested, into the 2012 petition filing.
While our family takes this step into the rest of our lives, we do so with the ultimate confidence in our country’s future. True, as at other times in the life of our nation, we live in an Age of Extremes that prizes intensity over sanity; rhetoric over reality; and destruction over creation. But this too shall pass, thanks to the infinite, inspired wisdom of the sovereign people who, with God’s continued blessings, will again affirm for the generations American Exceptionalism.
Recommended
Truly, it is a challenging and fortunate time to live in our blessed sanctuary of liberty.
In closing, to The People of Michigan’s 11th Congressional District, I can but say this: Thank you for the privilege of having worked for you.”
Reactions to the news were mixed. A few people were shocked or mystified, for various reasons.
WAIT, WHAT??? All this *after* a failed presidential campaign? RT @ashleyalderman BREAKING: Rep Thaddeus McCotter RESIGNS.
— Emily Allen (@emehlee) July 6, 2012
OHNO – who will write the songs? MI GOP Rep. Thaddeus McCotter announced Fri that he is resigning his House seat. #Maddow
— Joan Eisenstodt (@JoanEisenstodt) July 6, 2012
Thaddeus McCotter resigning. But he will leave a legacy of _________
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) July 6, 2012
Others didn’t seem terribly bothered.
https://twitter.com/llondo/status/221358347209818112
https://twitter.com/AmeeEllsworth/status/221365792082628608
Hard to imagine the House without Thaddeus McCotter. Hard to imagine it with him also, since I don't know what he looks like.
— 1964 Marginal Tax Rates NOW (@Robert20904) July 6, 2012
https://twitter.com/TexMex817/status/221358684201156609
Thaddeus McCotter, "embracing the promotion back from public servant to sovereign citizen". I am sorry to see him go.
— ❌PubliusNV (@PubliusNV) July 6, 2012
.@ThadMcCotter – Michigan's loss, but happy for you. Best of luck, good man!: Thaddeus McCotter Resigns From Congress" http://t.co/BMDrbnnr
— WTF? (@stevenferre) July 6, 2012
https://twitter.com/JackieSeal/status/221361334388928513
I will miss you Rep. Thad McCotter. No other congressmen talked to me about REM's break-up like you did. http://t.co/XzL9DBnW
— Chris Moody (@moody) July 6, 2012
Something tells us we haven’t seen the last of Thaddeus McCotter.
https://twitter.com/TheDailyZack/status/221354376260886528
While his congressional life may be behind him, we expect he’s got a standing invitation on “Red Eye.”
And, well, if there’s a silver lining in all this, it’s that he’ll have more time to develop his script-writing talent.
“Bumper Sticker: Made On Motown” starred McCotter hosting a crude variety show cast with characters bearing the nicknames of his congressional staffers, his brother and a drunk, perverted “Black Santa.” They take pot shots about McCotter’s ill-fated bid for the White House while spewing banter about drinking, sex, race, flatulence, puking and women’s anatomy. It features a cartoon intro and closing snippet with an Oldsmobile careening through Detroit and knocking over the city’s landmarks. The double-finned car has a Michigan license plate reading: “Made on MoTown.”
…
McCotter told The News the work was unfinished and was given to a reporter without his permission. He said the show was a “cathartic” creative outlet that helped him through the humiliation of the presidential campaign flop. “Bumper Sticker” brought to life a possibility of something that could be worse than his political failure — being trapped in a bad TV show that takes away “any shard of dignity left,” he told The Detroit News.
Hmmm … maybe not.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member