Republican Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas announced Sunday that he will not seek re-election, bringing an end to his more than 20 years in Congress.
“It’s been an honor to serve for over two decades in the Congress,” McCaul said on ABC “This Week.” “I’m looking now for a new challenge.”
The GOP congressman was first elected to the US House in 2004 and served as a ranking member and then chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee from 2019 to January 2025. He said he will serve the remainder of his term before seeking new opportunities in the national security and foreign policy space.
“I want to continue to serve the people of this country in national security and foreign policy and do what I’ve done the last two decades: make America stronger and the world safer,” McCaul, 63, said.
Before his tenure in Congress, McCaul served in a top counterterrorism role at the US attorney’s office in western Texas and was the state’s deputy attorney general.
In Congress, he was deeply critical of the chaotic withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan in 2021, leading the House Foreign Affairs Commitee in producing a report casting blame on the Biden administration for hastily pulling out of the US’ longest war.
He has also been a vocal supporter of Ukraine amid Russia’s war, pushing back against some of his Republican colleagues who have expressed a wariness of sending US aid to the war-torn country.
During Sunday’s interview, McCaul backed the ultimatum President Donald Trump issued to NATO countries a day earlier saying the US will issue “major” sanctions on Moscow only when the allies agree to do the same and stop buying oil from Russia.
He said he thinks Putin has been “manipulating the president” and not acting in good faith with the US in trying to end the war, but added that Trump is “waking up to the fact that Putin is not negotiating in good faith, not making concessions, and has to be dealt with.”
“The more Putin irritates the president, I think, the better we are in terms of defending NATO and Ukraine,” McCaul said.
NATO fighter jets shot down multiple Russian drones in the country Wednesday, marking the first time the military alliance fired shots since Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
“I don’t think that was a mistake,” the congressman said. “I think Putin is testing the resolve of NATO. He wants to see how NATO reacts, how Poland reacts. The good news is Poland … had a great response. They shut him down, but it shows you how aggressive Putin is getting in the region.”
CNN’s Alison Main contributed to this report.
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