WASHINGTON — California Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer, a tenacious liberal whose election to the Senate in 1992 heralded a new era for women at the upper reaches of political power, said Thursday she will not seek re-election to a new term next year.
Boxer’s retirement sets off a free-for-all among a new generation of California Democrats, who have had few offices to aspire to while Boxer and Sen. Dianne Feinstein had a lock on the state’s U.S. Senate seats.
A staunch supporter of abortion rights, gun control and environmental protections, Boxer has said she is most proud of the vote that she cast against the war in Iraq.
Boxer, 74, made the announcement in a mock video news conference with her grandson, Zach Rodham, acting as reporter. “I am never going to retire. The work is too important. But I will not be running for the Senate in 2016,” Boxer said.
“I want to help our Democratic candidate for president make history,” Boxer tells her grandson, a reference to a possible bid by Hillary Rodham Clinton.
She closed with a poem, “I won’t be working in my Senate space and I won’t be running in that next tough race.”
Boxer was elected to the House in 1982 and to the Senate one decade later. That was an election that marked a watershed year for women in politics, with four winning U.S. Senate seats.
White House spokesman Josh Earnest said President Barack Obama called Boxer to congratulate her.
Later at a news conference from her home in Rancho Mirage, Calif., she said, she was confident she could still accomplish much in her final two years.
“I don’t believe in lame-duckism. I think Barack Obama is proving that. Bill Clinton proved it, and I’m going to prove it.”
