U.S. Sen. Bob Corker, a former Chattanooga mayor and two-term Republican senator from Tennessee, said Tuesday he will not seek a third term come the 2018 elections.
“After much thought, consideration and family discussion over the past year, Elizabeth and I have decided that I will leave the United States Senate when my term expires at the end of 2018,” Corker, 65, said in a statement. “I also believe the most important public service I have to offer our country could well occur over the next 15 months, and I want to be able to do that as thoughtfully and independently as I did the first 10 years and nine months of my Senate career.”
That means our ever-ambitious Corker must have higher aspirations.
Why else would he have felt so free to tell his hometown Rotary Club in August that Trump has not “demonstrated the stability” or “competence” to be a successful president. Corker also said the nation will be “in peril” unless there are “radical changes” at the White House.
Staff file photo by Tim Barber U.S. Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., speaks to the Rotary Club of Chattanooga in August.It was quite a statement for the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and one who rarely criticizes fellow Congress members of either party – let alone the Republican president of the United States.