Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) announced Friday he will not seek another term in Congress after the Volunteer State’s legislature redrew his Memphis-area district.
Cohen, the lone Democrat in Tennessee’s 11-member House and Senate delegation, has represented the state’s majority-black 9th Congressional District since 2007.
The new map, signed into law by Tennessee GOP Gov. Bill Lee May 7, breaks up the deep-blue 9th District, making it part of three new Republican-leaning districts.
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“I don’t want to quit. I’m not a quitter,” Cohen, 76, told reporters in Washington. “But these districts were drawn to beat me.”
The lawmaker is challenging the state’s new map in court and caveated that he would re-enter the race if that lawsuit succeeded in restoring his old congressional district.
Tennessee is scheduled to hold its House and Senate primaries Aug. 6.
Cohen, a Memphis native, has developed a reputation as one of the most colorful characters in Congress, though critics say he routinely crosses the line into grandstanding.
In 2019, Cohen brought a bucket of fried chicken to a House Judiciary Committee hearing at which then-Attorney General Bill Barr was a no-show.
“The message is Attorney General Bill Barr is not brave enough to answer questions from a staff attorney and members of the Judiciary Committee,” the Democrat said in a statement at the time.
The previous year, Cohen was criticized by veteran groups when he told disgraced FBI official Peter Strzok: “If I could give you a Purple Heart, I would,” referring to a decoration reserved for wounded US service members.
Tennessee was the first to redraw its congressional map after the Supreme Court’s April 29 decision in Callais v. Lousiana, in which the justices found that intentionally drawing House districts primarily on the basis of race violated the 14th Amendment unless used to remedy specific instances of discrimination.
The 6-3 decision threw out Louisiana’s legislative map, which a federal judge had ordered redrawn to include a second majority-black district.
Since the ruling, Republicans in Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and South Carolina have moved to redraw their House maps ahead of the 2030 census.
