U.S. Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., officially resigned from the Senate on Sunday to become president of the University of Florida.
Sasse was once considered “The Future of the G.O.P. after Trump.” Now, he’s leaving the Senate just two years into his second term. He has had a complicated relationship with Republicans in Nebraska after his outspoken criticism of Trump. He was one of seven Republican senators to vote to convict the former president of “incitement of insurrection” after the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack.
In a farewell address, Sasse himself acknowledged his ambivalent relationship with his constituents.
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“Our wrestling together, Nebraskans and me, over the last eight years has had some market ups and downs, as you gave me victories in all 93 counties when I ran for office the very first time in my life in 2014, and then made me the most censured public official in the history of Nebraska over the next six years, but then proceeded two years ago to reelect me again, again winning all 93 counties and securing the most votes of anyone in the history of our state,” Sasse said on the Senate floor Wednesday.
“Many times it felt like a noogie and a slap and a head butt and a hug all at once.”
Nebraska’s new governor, Republican Jim Pillen, will pick Sasse’s replacement.
Pillen won last year’s gubernatorial election after receiving the endorsement of Pete Ricketts, a former governor barred by term limits. He prevailed over a candidate endorsed by Trump.
Nebraska’s governor issued a statement saying only that he’ll be conducting a thorough process to select the best candidate. He’s given a deadline of Dec. 23 for those interested in the seat to apply. Ricketts announced his application last week.
“I’ll be looking to appoint someone who embodies the commonsense, conservative values of Nebraska,” Pillen said.
The current governor has not revealed any names in consideration, but at least one Democrat has submitted an application: Ann Ashford, the Omaha widow of former Congressman Brad Ashford. Ann Ashford ran unsuccessfully for Nebraska’s Omaha-based 2nd Congressional District House seat in 2020.
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Nebraska Republicans have speculated that the current governor might appoint the former governor, in order to thank him for his endorsement.
Some Republicans have described Ricketts as a qualified, conservative voter, but they still don’t want him to buy a Senate seat.
“It looks bad. It smells bad. What it looks like is two rich guys using their money and power to grab a Senate seat,” said Jeremy Aspen, an Omaha Republican and former state party delegate. “This is how authoritarian countries operate, where a powerful few ride roughshod to get what they want. Things like this stay on voters’ minds.”
On the other hand, other Republicans were encouraging the former governor to appoint himself to the Senate.
Mark Fahleson, a former chairman of the Nebraska Republican Party, who stands by his comments that Ricketts should have appointed himself. “He’s the obvious candidate for the job,” the chairman has said.
Whoever is appointed to replace Sasse will serve two years before a special election is held in 2024 to finish out the last two years of the term. The person would have to seek re-election in 2026 for another six-year term.
Sasse gave his farewell address on Wednesday. In a self-aggrandizing speech, the senator compared his resignation to George Washington’s decision to retire after two terms… and he took a final swipe at Trump.
“False prophets of power would suggest that the only answer is more centralized power – ‘I alone can fix it’… I, as Nebraskans understood from day one on the campaign bus back in 2013, never planned to spend a lifetime in Washington. That’s not what our founders envisioned for the people they would send to the federal city. They envisioned, rather, congressmen, senators, and presidents who thought of DC as a temporary stay,” Sasse said.
“Our founders envisioned citizens who would govern themselves, not be governed by a distant imperial city, who would, as George Washington said and then repeated here, as we recite every year, in his Farewell Address, that folks would, ‘sit safely under their own vine and fig tree again.'”
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The Horn editorial team and the Associated Press contribtued to this article.