Few tears were shed on Capitol Hill on Wednesday for Representative Nancy Mace of South Carolina, after she finished an embarrassing fifth in the Republican primary for governor.
“Thoughts and prayers,” wrote Representative Sarah McBride of Delaware, the first openly transgender member of Congress whom Ms. Mace tormented by barring her from using women’s bathrooms on Capitol Hill. Many of her Republican colleagues shared the sentiment, though not publicly.
After all, Ms. Mace, the shape-shifting onetime moderate who made a full-blown turn toward Trumpism, had spent her five years on Capitol Hill performing one attention-grabbing stunt after another — she once paraded through the Capitol wearing a tight white tank top with a scarlet “A” emblazoned over her chest — offending and alienating people in both parties along the way.
Ms. Mace had one Trumpian view of politics that was immutable, and which has come to be shared by a certain set of her colleagues who quickly established themselves as flamboyant fixtures on Capitol Hill: that notoriety of any type can translate into power, and if people know your name and see your viral clips they will believe you are important.
Voters knew Ms. Mace’s name and unequivocally rejected her. But she was not the only House member who tried using the committee rooms and the chamber floor as platforms for viral moments that could be transformed into huge followings on social media, fund-raising dollars and fame.
Many of those showboats who proved to be naturals at this mode of politicking will be gone from the corridors of power in Washington next year, making the place possibly more functional, but also less colorful and noisy — until a new crop of lawmakers finds its footing and takes up the attention-seeking mantle.
Gone from under the dome next year will be Representative Jasmine Crockett, the firebrand Democrat from Texas, who famously coined the “bleach-blonde, bad-built butch body” moniker for former Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia during a late-night hearing of the Oversight Committee. (The subject of the session was quickly lost to history amid the shock of two rabble-rousing congresswomen reveling in personal insults.) Ms. Crockett lost the Democratic Senate primary earlier this year to James Talarico.
Ms. Greene herself, perhaps the biggest rabble rouser of all, ejected herself from Congress early, resigning in January, days after Mr. Trump branded his former ally a “traitor” for breaking with him and helping compel the Justice Department to release its files related to Jeffrey Epstein, the convicted sex offender.
Ms. Greene could generate entire news cycles all by herself, both when she was a die-hard MAGA loyalist trafficking in conspiracy theories and later, after she broke hard and permanently with Mr. Trump over a variety of issues. (In her later, arguably more mature iteration, Ms. Greene said she regretted believing some of the QAnon conspiracy theories she once echoed, stating on the House floor that “school shootings are absolutely real,” and that the 9/11 attacks “absolutely happened.”)
Gone, too, will be Representative Al Green, Democrat of Texas, the outspoken, cane-waving septuagenarian who twice got booted from presidential addresses at the Capitol for shouting and waving unapproved signs. After losing his Democratic primary earlier this month, Mr. Green will no longer be around to file articles of impeachment against President Trump, as he has done repeatedly, prompting eyerolls among colleagues who generally viewed them as an unhelpful distraction. And the State of the Union address will be missing one of its more reliable hecklers.
Representative Chip Roy, Republican of Texas, whose shouty floor speeches criticizing members of his own party — and Congress as a whole — made for delicious clips for cable news viewers who enjoy lapping up Republican-on-Republican violence, also lost his statewide race for attorney general last month. And with that, the Republican Conference will lose one of its most maddening holdouts on key votes, and reporters will be deprived of one of the more reliable quote generators who routinely says the quiet part out loud.
“At some point, people will look at this body and say maybe we should get rid of all 435 members of the House, and all 100 members of the Senate, and start over, because Congress is literally failing the American people,” Mr. Roy said earlier this year.
Clipped and saved.
Then there were those who stood out for different reasons, but still enjoyed basking in the spotlight, and whose departures will leave a gaping hole in the fabric of Congress.
Representative Thomas Massie, Republican of Kentucky, the raw milk-guzzling libertarian who wears a digital federal debt clock he made himself on his lapel, won’t be returning to Washington next year, after he lost his primary to a Trump-backed challenger. Unlike Ms. Mace, Mr. Massie generally attracted attention because he was the rare Republican with a core set of beliefs on which he would not compromise, regardless of the political consequences. That ultimately caught up with him.
The House will still have its fair share of flashy personalities.
Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the New York Democrat and progressive standout, is expected to easily win re-election in November and return next year amid speculation about whether she will seek a Senate seat or have a go at the presidency.
Despite being a new target of Mr. Trump’s ire, Representative Lauren Boebert, the Colorado Republican who was caught on a security camera in 2023 vaping and groping her date during a performance of the musical “Beetlejuice,” is seen as relatively safe in her re-election campaign, barring an upset.
And those who are gone are likely to simply look elsewhere for a platform where they can continue vying for attention. Ms. Greene, for instance, earlier this week announced a new online series, “Life with MTG,” which is expected to include political conversations and lifestyle segments.
Ms. Mace was already back online on Wednesday morning, acknowledging her defeat and jumping into the next fight — this time with Graham Platner, the embattled Democratic nominee for Senate in Maine, who if he wins could help fill the character void on the Hill.
“Enjoying my first cup of coffee since getting my ass kicked last night,” Ms. Mace wrote on social media, “and reading about how Dems nominated the guy with the nazi tattoo.”
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