Representative Derek Kilmer says this term will be his last as a member of Congress

Six-term Unit­ed States Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Derek Kilmer, D‑Washington, announced in a let­ter Thurs­day that he will not seek reelec­tion to Con­gress next year, cit­ing the need for new chal­lenges in his life and more time with the fam­i­ly he loves.

“I’m a pret­ty young guy with more chap­ters in my life,” Kilmer, forty-nine, wrote. “My plan is to ensure those chap­ters enable me to con­tin­ue to make a pos­i­tive dif­fer­ence. And I’d sure like to make a bit more time for those I love.”

Kilmer was elect­ed in 2012 to suc­ceed retir­ing Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Norm Dicks, who had first been elect­ed to the House in 1976, when Kilmer was but two years old.

Wash­ing­ton’s Com­mis­sion­er of Pub­lic Lands Hilary Franz is expect­ed by peo­ple in the know to leave her cam­paign for gov­er­nor, per­haps with­in hours, and announce that she is run­ning for Kilmer’s seat. Twelve years ago, when Dicks retired, an imme­di­ate announce­ment from Kilmer pre­empt­ed the field.

Dur­ing his time in Con­gress, Kilmer has served on the House Appro­pri­a­tions Com­mit­tee. He chaired, for four years, the Select Com­mit­tee on the Mod­ern­iza­tion of Con­gress, a bipar­ti­san pan­el which deliv­ered 200 rec­om­men­da­tions on how to improve the creaky, often-dys­func­tion­al “people’s House.”

“The Mod­ern­iza­tion Com­mit­tee showed that Con­gress can do things bet­ter when folks check their par­ti­san agen­das at the door and just focus on work­ing togeth­er,” Kilmer wrote.

While a ris­ing fig­ure in Con­gress, Kilmer kept a hand-on approach to the 6th Dis­trict, which includes both the Kit­sap and Olympic Penin­su­la. The dis­trict includes rust-belt mill towns, a great nation­al park, a major U.S. Navy ship­yard, and – in Hood Canal and Puget Sound – sen­si­tive marine waters in need of cleanup.

Kilmer nev­er put on airs. His offi­cial biog­ra­phy men­tioned Port Ange­les High School, down­played Prince­ton, and did not ref­er­ence his doc­tor­ate from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Oxford in Eng­land. He prepped for Con­gress with eight years in the Wash­ing­ton Leg­is­la­ture, serv­ing as State Sen­a­tor for a swing dis­trict on the Kit­sap Peninsula.

“It’s been my hon­or rep­re­sent­ing my home­town of Port Ange­les and the entire Olympic Penin­su­la,” he wrote.

“My upbring­ing – see­ing the chal­lenges fac­ing our region – moti­vat­ed my ser­vice. It’s why the core mis­sion of my office has been to cre­ate more oppor­tu­ni­ties for more peo­ple in more places.”

The 6th Dis­trict cov­ers a lot of ground, as did Kilmer.

In a newslet­ter ear­li­er this year, he described the heavy dawn-past-dusk sched­ules to be endured, both in the dis­trict and in D.C.

He acknowl­edged on Thurs­day that it’s tak­en its toll. “As nour­ish­ing as this job has been, it has come at pro­found cost to my fam­i­ly,” he allowed.

“Every the­atri­cal per­for­mance, musi­cal recital I missed, every fam­i­ly din­ner I was not there for. The dis­tance I felt from my fam­i­ly for months after Jan­u­ary 6th.”

More time-with-my-fam­i­ly is a fre­quent rea­son for leav­ing pol­i­tics, fre­quent­ly used by those in dan­ger of los­ing their seats seats.

Kilmer has rep­re­sent­ed a dis­trict labeled “safe Demo­c­ra­t­ic” that Pres­i­dent Biden car­ried in 2020 by a sev­en­teen-point margin.

With Kilmer, the oblig­a­tion seems genuine.

He has for years writ­ten let­ters to his two off­spring, Sophie and Aven, on his duties, ini­tial­ly chat­ty and late­ly of grow­ing expla­na­tion into the impor­tance of his work. “I tried to com­mu­ni­cate to them that every day, in every way, I was try­ing to make things bet­ter for their gen­er­a­tion – and for their country.”

Kilmer has also chaired – and co-chaired with Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Suzan Del­Bene, D‑Washington – the New Demo­c­rat Coali­tion, a bloc of Demo­c­ra­t­ic prag­ma­tists in Con­gress. The NDs include most of the Demo­c­ra­t­ic law­mak­ers from so-called swing dis­tricts. In his let­ter, Kilmer tout­ed the group: “The New Democ­rats are the best kept secret in pol­i­tics – a group of prag­mat­ic, prob­lem-solv­ing Democ­rats who chase impact rather than head­lines. Sim­ply put, they’ve focused on get­ting things done for the Amer­i­can peo­ple. Our pol­i­tics could use more of that.”

Kilmer has one major task left relat­ing to his district.

He craft­ed, spon­sored, and has twice pushed through the House a Wild Olympics bill, pre­serv­ing as wilder­ness an addi­tion­al 126,000 acres of fed­er­al land in the Olympic Nation­al For­est, sur­round­ing the Olympic Nation­al Park.

The leg­is­la­tion has stalled in the U.S. Senate.

Kilmer held hear­ings around the Olympic Penin­su­la before writ­ing the bill, which would also pro­tect more than a dozen streams under the fed­er­al Wild and Scenic Rivers Act. The result has been leg­is­la­tion sup­port­ed by con­ser­va­tion groups, busi­ness­es large and small, as well as the eight native tribes of the Peninsula.

With Dicks and now Kilmer, Wash­ing­ton’s 6th Dis­trict has been splen­did­ly rep­re­sent­ed in Con­gress for near­ly fifty years.