President Of Oregon Senate To Retire
By Dillon Bergmann
SALEM, Ore., Jan. 5, 2022 (SCROLL) — The president of the Oregon Senate, Peter Courtney (D-Central Salem), has announced that he will not be seeking re-election and that he will be retiring at the end of the 81st Oregon Legislative Assembly. President Courtney, aged 78, has been the head of the Oregon Senate since 2003, and a member of the Oregon Legislative Assembly since 1989, the longest tenure of any senator in Oregon’s history.
Courtney’s decision leaves an open leadership position that Democrats will likely fill after the 2022 general election. No clear contenders have yet emerged. Progressives hope that — with the departure of President Courtney — they will have an even easier time passing legislation which they view as vital; however, other more moderate members of the branch fear that if a more progressive president is elected there will be more dysfunction in the Senate.
“I am incredibly grateful to [Courtney] for his decades of service to the state,” Senator Steiner Hayward, who represents many neighborhoods in the Sunset area, told OPB; “He’s made invaluable contributions to the legislature.” Mrs. Steiner Hayward could be a potential replacement for President Courtney. Hayward is the co-chair of the powerful Joint Committee on Ways and Means, which is a committee made up of senators and representatives who oversee the budget and is the most influential committee in the state. There are other potential successors as well, such as the president pro-tempore, or deputy president, of the Senate, James I. Manning Jr. (D-North Eugene), who has risen to prominence during the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020 and is one of the only people of color in the Oregon Senate. There is also the majority leader, Rob Wanger (D-South Portland), who is one of the youngest members of the Senate and has been viewed as a rising star due to his young age. No senator has publicly announced their candidacy for the position.
