Hollings leaving politics

last updated 8 January 2015

Columbia, S.C.

Sen. Ernest “Fritz” Hollings announced this week that he would not seek re-election next year. “I am frustrated with Washington,” said Hollings, 81. “It has gotten totally partisan.” Hollings complained that Washington politicians have been reduced to campaigning machines who spend most of their time working to get re-elected and too little of it working for their constituents. Hollings’ departure could be costly for Democrats, who may have trouble holding onto the seat in increasingly Republican South Carolina. Hollings was first elected to the Senate in 1966. “I think Fritz wanted to go out the way he came in,” a state Democratic leader said, “tough as nails and sharp as a tack.”