Rep. Ken Buck, R-Colo., who announced last year he will not seek re-election in November, said Tuesday he is resigning March 22, reducing the Republican Party’s majority in the House to an even slimmer margin.
Buck, 65, who has represented Colorado’s heavily Republican fourth congressional district since 2015, was a member of the House Judiciary and Foreign Affairs committees.
Buck told CNN that dysfunction on Capitol Hill was a big reason for his departure.
"It is the worst year of the nine years and three months that I've been in Congress and having talked to former members, it’s the worst year in 40, 50 years to be in Congress," he said. "But I’m leaving because I think there's a job to do out there.
"This place has just devolved into this bickering and nonsense and not really doing the job for the American people."
Bucks' departure will leave the House Republican majority will a 218-213 margin over Democrats, meaning they can only lose two votes to pass legislation along party lines when everyone is attending and voting.
Buck told CNN that having former President Donald Trump as the GOP nominee for November's election was not a factor in his decision.
"Whether he was the nominee or not, I think our system is broken in how we choose candidates and I want to get involved in that process," Buck said. "Everywhere I go in Colorado, I hear that people are not happy with Trump and they’re not happy with [President Joe] Biden.
"I am going to find the right organization to join and I'm going to start working on that issue. We have to have better candidates up and down the ballot.”
When he announced late last year that he would not seek re-election, Buck gave blistering criticism of the Republican Party in a video posted on YouTube.
"Our nation is on a collision course with reality, and a steadfast commitment to truth, even uncomfortable truths, is the only way forward," Buck said. "Too many Republican leaders are lying to America, claiming that the 2020 election was stolen, describing Jan. 6 as an unguided tour of the Capitol. And asserting that the ensuing prosecutions are a weaponization of our justice system.
"These insidious narratives breed widespread cynicism and erodes American's confidence in the rule of law. It is impossible for the Republican Party to confront our problems and offer a course correction for the future while being obsessively fixated on retribution and vengeance for contrived injustices of the past."
Buck recently went against the House leadership in voting not to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. The House ended up impeaching Mayorkas last month in a 216-14 vote.
In an op-ed in the Washington Post in September, Buck said the impeachment inquiry into Biden was based "on an imagined history," comparing it to the first impeachment of Trump in 2019 over his phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
"This trend among Republicans is a significant departure in the enduring principles of conservatism," Buck said in his video statement. "We belong to the party of Abraham Lincoln and Roanld Reagan. Our movement has always been fueled by immutable truths about human nature, individual liberty, and economic freedoms. The Republican Party today however is ignoring self-evident truths about the rule of law and limited government in exchange for self-serving lies.
"I made a decision to leave Congress because tough votes are replaced by social media status. It's time to stop feeding popular narratives and start addressing the long-term solutions. I believe American's exceptionalism lies in the answers developed from the governed, not the government. My passion is to work with Americans to encourage advocacy for the long-term reforms that we need to implement."