Rep. Morgan Luttrell, R-Texas, a member of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee, is among several lawmakers with military backgrounds who’ve announced they will not seek reelection in 2026. (Eric Kayne/Stars and Stripes)
WASHINGTON — Several high-profile veterans in Congress will not seek reelection in 2026, as a record number of lawmakers have declared they will not run again.
Some of the military veterans leaving Congress expressed frustration over increasing polarization, divides within their own party and an environment of “plain nastiness” in Washington, D.C.
A total of 55 incumbents will not run in midterm elections this year — 46 in the House and nine in the Senate.
With Republicans holding a majority in both chambers, elections in November will likely sway the balance of power on Capitol Hill.
At least seven lawmakers who will exit Congress in January 2027 are military veterans. Five are Republicans, and two are Democrats.
In the House, they include Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., a retired Air Force brigadier general; Rep. Morgan Luttrell, R-Texas, a medically discharged Navy SEAL; Rep. Troy Nehls, R-Texas, a retired Army Reserve major; and Rep. Jared Golden, D-Maine, a former corporal in the Marine Corps.
“I’m choosing a different path — one that allows me to stay rooted in Texas and focus on the people and places that matter most,” said Luttrell, who is finishing out his second term representing Texas’ eighth congressional district.
A total of 79 lawmakers in the House are veterans, and there are 18 veterans in the Senate. A significant number, like Luttrell, served in the military following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Luttrell, a member of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee, served as a Navy SEAL who was medically retired in 2014 as a lieutenant, after a 14-year military career. He suffered a traumatic brain injury and spinal cord injury in a helicopter crash in 2009 in Afghanistan.
“My service to our great nation started in the Air Force, where I served 16 assignments, five commands and four deployments and will continue in Congress until the end of the 119th Congress,” said Bacon, a 30-year Air Force veteran.
But Bacon, who has served in Congress since 2017, said he is not ruling out runs for governor or the White House.
Bacon, a member of the House Armed Services Committee, has expressed frustration about the current “dysfunction” in Washington and sharp divisions within his own party.
In 2025, Bacon said he was “mad as hell” after the U.S. voted against a resolution condemning Russia’s aggression in Ukraine.
In the Senate, veterans not seeking another term include Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, a retired Army lieutenant colonel; Gary Peters, D-Mich., a Navy Reserve veteran; and Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., the former Senate majority leader, whose Army Reserve service in 1967 ended with basic training because of a serious eye condition.
McConnell has been a steadfast supporter of military aid to Ukraine and critical of the approach by President Donald Trump’s administration for a peace deal as too soft on Russia.
“Rewarding Russian butchery would be disastrous to America’s interests,” said McConnell, in his seventh term. McConnell, 83, disclosed in early 2025 he would not run again.
Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, was the first female combat veteran elected to the Senate in 2014. She is shown with John Phelan at his 2025 confirmation hearing to be Navy secretary. (Eric Kayne/Stars and Stripes)
When Ernst announced in September 2025 that she would not seek reelection, she said she was sticking to her plan not to serve more than two terms.
Ernst in 2014 was the first female combat veteran elected to the Senate.
Ernst, a 55-year-old cancer survivor, was a strong advocate for passage of the 2022 PACT Act, which granted benefits and compensation to veterans who became sick from toxic exposures, including burn pits, Agent Orange and radiation.
But Ernst also faced criticism within the Trump administration over her initial hesitancy to support Pete Hegseth, an Army National Guard veteran and Fox News host, as defense secretary.
She raised concern about Hegseth’s statement on a podcast that “we should not have women in combat roles” and about prior sexual misconduct allegations against him.
But Hegseth emphasized in his confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee the need for “equal,” not “equitable,” standards for men and women in the military.
Ernst ended up backing Hegseth’s nomination, with her vote considered pivotal to his approval.
Peters, a 67-year-old attorney and former naval officer, has complained recently that it is hard to advance policies in the current political climate in Washington.
“Politics are more polarized. Working together to help people does not get rewarded in this environment,” Peters said on a Detroit radio talk show.
Peters is completing his third term in the Senate, after three terms in the House.
“The [politicians] who get the most attention are the ones who are more provocative. It’s about performative politics — getting the most clicks on social media — instead of getting things done,” Peters said.
Peters served in the Navy Reserve from 1993 to 2008. He was a supply corps officer deployed to the Persian Gulf. He achieved the rank of lieutenant commander.
Rep. Jared Golden, D-Maine, a Marine Corps veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, cites incivility, “plain nastiness” and polarization in Congress in his decision not to run again. Golden is shown meeting with constituents at a Maine diner in 2021. (Office of Rep. Jared Golden)
Golden, 43, also complained about the political climate in Washington.
Public incivility, “plain nastiness” and threats of violence against him and other politicians convinced Golden to step aside, he wrote in a recent guest editorial in the Bangor Daily News, a Maine newspaper.
“I have never loved politics. But I find purpose and meaning in service, and the Marine in me has been able to slog along through the many aspects of politics I dislike by focusing on the good work that Congress is capable of producing with patience and determination,” Golden wrote.
Golden served in the Marine Corps from 2002 to 2006, achieving the rank of corporal. He had combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Golden, who sits on the House Armed Services Committee, has served in the House since 2018. But he expressed safety concerns for himself and his family if he runs again.
“As my oldest daughter reaches school age, the threats, the intolerance and hate that often dominate political culture, and my long absences, will be more keenly felt,” Golden wrote. “I have to consider whether the good I can achieve outweighs everything my family endures as a result.”
