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In reply to the discussion: Sen. Barbara Boxer announces 2016 retirement: 'I want to come home' [View all]Xithras
(16,191 posts)Dianne Feinstein has been hinting for a while that her 2012 election may have been her last, and that she may not run in 2018. She'd be running at 85 years old, and that term wouldn't end until she was 91. She's commented a few times that she does want to retire at some point, and doesn't want to stay in office until she dies. It became a bigger issue last fall, when several different sources close to her suggested that she would retire if the Republicans took the Senate, because she would wield a lot less influence. She has stayed in Congress this long only because her seniority put her in charge of some very powerful committees, and she didn't want them to pass into the hands of less able people. Now that the Republicans control the Senate, she's lost much of that power anyway.
The complication, of course, is that Gavin Newsom was named long ago as her heir apparent. If Boxer retires and Newsom runs for her seat, that makes Feinstein's seat a LOT more competitive in 2018. Kamala Harris is being groomed to run for the Governors seat after Browns term is up, and there is no way that the state party is going to send her off to Congress and risk the best shot they have at holding the governorship in 2018. People in California LIKE Harris, so shipping her across the country seems counter intuitive. Besides, I want Harris to run for President someday, and the Senate has historically been a lousy way to get there.
That really just leaves Alex Padilla (longtime state senator and current Secretary of State) and Antonio Villaraigosa as names that are well known enough statewide to really have a solid shot at the seat. Both would be popular with a broad swath of the electorate, but I don't think I've seen any indications that either of them are interested in Washington. Both seem more interested in state races.