After a failed bid to be her party’s Presidential candidate and investigations into her Presidential campaign expenditure looming over head, Minnesota 6th district Senator Michele Bachman has announced that she would be quitting and would not seek re-election in 2014 elections. Bachman used a video on her website and the You Tube to announce her retirement from active politics. However, the Tea Party voice of the Republican Party remained defiant as ever, claiming her decision to quit has nothing to do with legal enquiries into her spending or any worries about losing the re-election. She said that she is confident that she would have won the election once again in 2014.
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Michele Bachman appeared as a very confident woman in her farewell video and said that even though she was quitting from active politics, it didn’t mean show would give up on her fight against policies that were detrimental to religious liberty, marriage, and family values. These are the issues that Michele has held dear to her heart all her public life. She says she would continue to fight for these issues. Experts believe that Michele Bachman, even if she quits active politics, has many options up her sleeve that could fetch her lucrative deals such as radio talk shows and TV shows. This is because the issues that she fights for such as opposition to abortion and traditional marriage are dear to millions of Americans and she has a national profile few of the existing senators can boast of.
Michele said that if 8 years is enough for the President to serve the country, then her term as a Congresswoman for nearly 8 years is enough for her as well. She did not make a mention of how she barely eked out a victory from her opponent in the last election and how her fundraising this year has been dismal thus far. Bachman however did say that she did not want to contest the House election in 2012 after losing out on her bid to be the Presidential nominee of her party. But the bleak prospects of another candidate forced her to stay in the race and she won the election. She says that she has no doubts in her mind that she would win the next election too, and her decision to quit has nothing to do with her fears of losing in the next re-election.
When asked about her future program or options, she said that no career or opportunity is bigger than the opportunity
to be able to serve and protect the great nation. Given the troubled waters she was fishing in, the decision to quit and not seek a re-election in 2014 is probably the best decision that Bachman could have taken. This prevents Democrats gunning for her in 2014 as they would now be targeting an unknown opponent without any political baggage.
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All said and done, Michele Bachman’s rise and fall in politics reflects the strengths and weaknesses of the tea party politics as well.
