The departures in January of Sens. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), Joe Manchin (I- W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz) will leave a huge hole in the Senate for bipartisanship.
Romney, Manchin and Sinema opted not to seek re-election after being routinely vilified by their own parties after demonstrating a willingness to work across the aisle to find common ground. Manchin and Sinema were Democrats who became independents.
In 2020, the three senators joined a group of 10 senators — five Republicans and five Democrats —who cooperated closely during the Covid-19 pandemic to work out a stalled relief package. The group subsequently helped draft and pass a bipartisan infrastructure bill, a significant gun-safety law, a codification of same-sex marriage rights with protections for religious liberty and a reform of the Electoral Count Act after its defects were exposed on Jan. 6, 2021.
Five of those 10 lawmakers won’t be in the Senate in 2025. In addition to losing Romney, Manchin and Sinema, Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) was one of three Democratic senators defeated for re-election last November. Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) retired in 2023.
The five remaining senators include: Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), Susan Collins (R-Maine), Bill Cassidy (R-La.), Mark Warner (D-Va.) and Jeanne Shaheen (D- N.H.). After years of intensifying polarization, the ranks of political centrists have been depleted. Today’s political incentives, with lawmakers more concerned about their primaries than the general election, make it hard to see the void being filled.
Romney, Manchin and Sinema spent years sounding the alarm on the death of bipartisanship. Even hardened partisans will come to miss the pragmatic Senate dealmakers who sought common ground amid ever-more-extreme polarization.
Romney’s political retirement might be the most noteworthy. His reputation as a policy wonk and problem-solver who seeks compromise is increasingly out of step with both Republican politicians and voters today.
And, of course, his strong longstanding expressed opposition to the actions and words of Donald Trump drew the ire of many Republicans beginning in 2016. He was willing to say on the record what many GOP colleagues would say only on condition of anonymity.
In 2020, Romney won plaudits from Democrats and independents for his courageous stand on principle in becoming the first senator in U.S. history to vote to convict a president of his own party in an impeachment trial. Romney concluded President Trump abused his power by holding up vital military assistance for Ukraine approved by Congress.
Six other Senate Republicans joined him a year later in voting to convict Trump of inciting the Jan. 6 Capitol attack. Romney earned the enduring enmity of avid Trump supporters for his impeachment votes. Romney ran for the Senate in 2018 because he felt he could counterbalance Trumpism.
But Romney now acknowledges Trump’s commanding appeal in the party he once led. “MAGA is the Republican Party and Donald Trump is the Republican Party today,” he concedes.
As Romney delivered his Senate farewell speech, senators from both parties requested floor time to recognize Romney for his work on bipartisan legislation, his unifying leadership and his character.
He said his biggest regret is not addressing the growing $36.1 trillion national debt. In 2011, Indiana’s Republican Governor Mitch Daniels identified unsustainable debt, then $14.8 trillion, as the new “Red Menace.” Daniels pleaded for a bipartisan social issues “truce” so common ground could be found on debt reduction.
Unfortunately, debt today is an “orphan issue.” Neither Trump nor congressional Democrats seem to care about it. Romney’s fight was worth waging — and continuing to wage.
Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) urged his colleagues to emulate Romney: “As we solve problems that only can be solved by people on both sides of the aisle coming together and taking the heat that comes with that, let’s ask ourselves over the next two or four years: What would Mitt Romney do?”
E-mail Jim Hartman at lawdocman1@aol.com.