Pat Leahy Announces He Will Retire From the U.S. Senate

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At property 81, the Vermont Democrat has served successful the Senate for astir fractional a century.

Senator Patrick J. Leahy and his wife, Marcelle, astatine  the Vermont State House connected  Monday.
Credit...John Tully for The New York Times

Emily Cochrane

Nov. 15, 2021Updated 10:50 a.m. ET

Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont and the chamber’s longest-serving member, announced connected Monday that helium would discontinue astatine the extremity of his word alternatively than seeking re-election successful 2022, closing retired astir fractional a period of work successful Congress.

Mr. Leahy, archetypal elected successful 1974 astatine property 34 aft moving arsenic a prosecutor, announced his determination astatine a quality league successful Montpelier, Vermont’s capital.

“It is clip to walk the torch to the adjacent Vermonter,” Mr. Leahy, 81, said. “It is clip to travel home.”

The lone sitting legislator who served during President Gerald Ford’s term, Mr. Leahy is the archetypal and lone registered Democrat to beryllium elected to correspond Vermont successful the Senate. Mr. Leahy precocious became the 4th longest-serving senator successful American history, according to Senate records, and finishing his word astatine the extremity of 2022 volition marque him the 3rd longest-serving.

Mr. Leahy serves arsenic president pro tempore of the Senate — a relation reserved for the bulk party’s astir elder subordinate that puts him 3rd successful enactment to the presidency — and the president of the almighty Senate Appropriations Committee, which oversees authorities funding.

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