Dodd exit opens door for WWE’s McMahon, other Republicans

Christopher Dodd, saying he was in “the toughest political shape” of his career, announced Wednesday he will retire from the U.S. Senate, ending a four-decade career in Congress.

Dodd said outside his home in East Haddam that he would not run for a sixth term.

Dodd’s political stock fell after a controversy involving low-rate mortgages he received under a VIP program, the financial meltdown and his failed 2008 presidential bid. The 65-year-old chairman of the Senate Banking Committee was trailing former Republican Congressman Rob Simmons in the polls.

Dodd, who also served three terms in the House, said it’s been a tough year for him.

“I lost a beloved sister in July and, in August, Ted Kennedy. I battled cancer over the summer, and in the midst of all of this, found myself in the toughest political shape of my career.”

Connecticut’s popular Democratic attorney general, Richard Blumenthal, is set to officially announce later Wednesday he will run for Dodd’s seat.

Blumenthal, 63, has been attorney general since 1990, but said he has had his eye on the Senate for years.

“The United States Senate has been a longtime public service goal, and I would be proud and honored to have the opportunity to serve the people of Connecticut … in the Senate,” Blumenthal told The Associated Press on Wednesday before his announcement.

The Senate Banking Committee was at the center of efforts to deal with the economic meltdown. And Dodd has played a prominent role in the debate over overhauling health care, taking over for Kennedy during his illness and then after his death.

“You have honored me beyond words with your confidence,” Dodd said. “Let me quickly add that there have been times when my positions and actions have caused some of you to question that confidence. I regret that.”

Dodd led his primary challenger, businessman and former Air Force officer Merrick Alpert, in the polls, but those surveys suggested that his Republican challengers stood a chance of knocking him off in the November election.

“He really was not able to budge his low honesty and trustworthy number and that’s something really hard for an elected official to change,” Quinnipiac University Poll Director Douglas Schwartz said. “Once people don’t trust you, it’s a tough thing to turn around.”

Two of the three Republicans running for Dodd’s seat said his decision to drop out of the race won’t hurt their chances.

“Whoever the Democratic nominee is, he or she will have to defend the failed Democratic policies of higher taxes, bigger government, exploding debt, and a misguided approach to national security,” Simmons said.

Republican candidate Linda McMahon, the former chief executive of World Wrestling Entertainment, said Dodd’s leaving the race doesn’t change anything for her.

A message was left Wednesday for a spokesman for Peter Schiff, the third GOP candidate for Dodd’s seat.

With Blumenthal as the candidate, Democrats have the edge, Schwartz said. His lowest job approval number since 2001 was 71 percent in November 2004. His highest was 81 percent in March 2009.

“It’s not over, but certainly the Democrats are in much better shape,” Schwartz said. “The race has flipped from leaning Republican to leaning Democrat.”

Howard Reiter, a University of Connecticut political science professor emeritus, said Blumenthal starts out in a strong position, but could face some new challenges.

“We’ll have to see how he is in a tough campaign, because I don’t think he’s had a tough campaign in a long time,” Reiter said. “He’s been a very activist attorney general, but as a campaigner he’s never had to break a sweat.”

Blumenthal, a former Marine who lives in Greenwich with his wife and four children, was U.S. attorney for Connecticut from 1977 to 1981, served in the state House of Representatives from 1984 to 1987 and served in the state Senate from 1987 to 1990.

A graduate of Harvard and Yale’s law school, Blumenthal was a law clerk to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Harry A. Blackmun. He also served as an administrative assistant to former Connecticut Sen. Abraham Ribicoff, and was an aide to former New York Sen. Daniel Moynihan, when Moynihan was assistant to the president.

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