A Republican US senator from North Carolina has said he will not run for reelection next year, a day after he opposed a sprawling budget bill that is key to President Donald Trump’s agenda.
Thom Tillis, 64, announced he would leave Congress because he said independent thinkers in Washington had become “an endangered species”.
Trump criticised Tillis on Saturday for not backing the One Big Beautiful Bill Act and threatened to support other candidates.
The president has also denounced other fellow Republican lawmakers who oppose his bill, including Senator Rand Paul and congressman Thomas Massie, both of Kentucky.
A final Senate vote on passage of the spending plan is expected in the coming days. It narrowly cleared the House of Representatives last month.
Tillis has held public office in North Carolina since 2007 and has been a senator since 2015.
In his statement on Sunday, he said he was proud of his career in public service, and especially of what he called “bipartisan victories”.
“Sometimes those bipartisan initiatives got me in trouble with my own party, but I wouldn’t have changed a single one,” he wrote.
He added that in recent years lawmakers who are “willing to embrace bipartisanship, compromise, and demonstrate independent thinking” have become a rare sight in Washington.
“Too many elected officials are motivated by pure raw politics who really don’t give a damn about the people they promised to represent on the campaign trail,” Tillis wrote.
On Sunday, Trump called Tillis “a talker and complainer”.
He was one of two Republican senators who voted against advancing Trump’s spending and tax cuts bill on Saturday.
Tillis said the legislation’s cuts to Medicaid, a healthcare programme that is used by millions of elderly, disabled and low-income Americans, would be “devastating” to people in North Carolina.
The bill proposes a work requirement on most adults in order to qualify for benefits.
It also reduces the amount of taxes states can charge medical providers, the funds from which are used heavily to finance Medicaid.
“I did my homework on behalf of North Carolinians, and I cannot support this bill in its current form,” Tillis said on Saturday. “It would result in tens of billions of dollars in lost funding for North Carolina.”
Republicans who support the bill have dismissed Tillis’ criticism, saying the proposed changes to Medicaid will eliminate fraud and waste and ensure the programme is viable in the long run.
The Congressional Budget Office, a non-partisan federal agency, estimated late on Saturday that the changes would result in nearly 12 million Americans losing their health coverage.
Trump has also threatened to back another candidate in the Republican primary ahead of next year’s midterm elections, saying he would be meeting with “numerous” contenders to challenge Tillis.
Speculation is already rife that Lara Trump, the president’s daughter-in-law and a North Carolina native, might run for the seat, though she has not commented.
Trump has issued similar threats to other lawmakers who have not supported his marquee bill.
US news outlet Politico reported on Sunday, citing anonymous sources, that the White House was looking for challengers to Thomas Massie.
Trump dubbed Massie a “loser” in a post on the Truth Social platform last week.
“He votes, ‘NO!’ on everything, because he thinks it makes him cool,” the president wrote.
By BBC News
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