WASHINGTON—Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., will retire from Congress at the end of 2024 after three decades in the Senate and more than 50 years in public office, she announced in a statement Tuesday.
“I am announcing today that I will not be running for re-election in 2024, but I intend to accomplish as much as I can for California until the end of next year when my term ends,” Feinstein said.
Feinstein, 89, is currently the oldest member of the upper house and her state’s longest-serving senator, first elected to the Senate in 1992.
She said in her statement Tuesday that she remains focused on passing legislation to address gun violence, promote economic growth and preserve American lands. Feinstein said she is confident Democrats can achieve those goals because of her past work.
«Even with a divided Congress, we can still pass bills that will make life better,» he said. «Every one of us was sent here to solve problems. That’s what I’ve done for the last 30 years, and that’s what I plan to do for the next two years.»
Feinstein had been under pressure for years from other Democrats in the state to make room for a younger generation of lawmakers to fill her seat. He had also declined the role in the new Congress of president pro tempore, which has traditionally been the oldest member of the majority party since the middle of the 20th century.
His retirement also opens his California Senate seat for the first time in decades. Several House Democrats have announced a 2024 campaign bid for the position, including Reps. Katie Porter and Adam Schiff. Rep. Barbara Lee also plans to announce a Senate run later this month, a source familiar with NBC News confirmed.
Feinstein has worked under five presidential administrations and alongside the two presidents who also served with her in the Senate: Barack Obama and Joe Biden.
In April 2022, she pushed against a news report citing several anonymous colleagues who expressed concern that she was mentally unfit to serve. And as recently as December, she was still publicly broadcasting that she had no plans to retire.
Feinstein’s retirement caps a career focused on advocating for more restrictive gun measures, including defending the assault weapons ban that then-President Bill Clinton signed into law in 1994 and advancing restrictive laws since the ban’s expiration in 2004. .
As a ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee during President Donald Trump’s four years in the White House, Feinstein led the Democrats’ line of attack against three Supreme Court justice nominees: Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett.
Feinstein has also long been a fierce advocate for advancing gay rights and same-sex marriage. She was one of 14 senators who voted against the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996 and hailed the Supreme Court’s decision to legalize gay marriage.
He chaired the Senate Intelligence Committee while President Obama was in the White House and led a six-year review of the CIA’s detention and interrogation program developed after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, which led to legislation that prohibited the use of those methods. of torture
Feinstein has been known for trying to find common ground with Republicans, sometimes receiving criticism from more progressive members of her party. She parted ways with them, for example, on a number of issues, including opposing government-run single-payer health care and the Green New Deal climate proposal, which she argued was politically and fiscally unfeasible.
The California senator has been criticized at times for some of her positions. She voted, for example, in favor of the resolution authorizing the Iraq war, but later said that she regretted that decision.
Prior to her election to the Senate in 1992, Feinstein served as San Francisco’s first female mayor and, prior to that, as a member and chairwoman of the city’s Board of Supervisors. She became mayor after the murders of Mayor George Moscone and City Supervisor Harvey Milk, the first openly gay elected official in California. Feinstein was the first person to find Milk’s body after he was shot.