House oversight committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz said Wednesday that he’s wants to “loosen up the tie a little bit” and enjoy more balance in his life after retiring from Congress.
“I haven’t felt any compulsion to talk about my post-congressional life,” the Utah Republican said when asked by CNN’s Wolf Blitzer about his future plans on “The Situation Room” Wednesday. “But I have a voice, I’d like to express it along the way. But find more balance in my life. So we’ll cross that bridge when we get to July 1.”
The Utah Republican would not say whether he hopes to take a position at Fox News after he leaves Congress.
“Again, Wolf, I’m not here to talk about that yet,” he said. “We’re going to do that at proper time.”
Chaffetz plans to retire on June 30.
Chaffetz is head of the committee that is the House’s investigatory arm into the Executive Branch. Since January, his panel has begun digging into President Donald Trump’s firing of FBI Director James Comey and the former director’s memo saying Trump asked him to drop the investigation into former national security adviser Michael Flynn.
The lawmaker emphasized that his departure comes from a desire to “find more balance” in his life.
“At some point, you’ve got to get off this crazy train,” Chaffetz said. “There’s always somebody doing something stupid somewhere, there’s always plenty of things to investigate and look at.”
He announced his intention to resign from Congress in a letter posted on social media last week.
“As you know, after careful consideration and long discussion with my wife, Julie, we agree the time has come for us to move on from this part of our life,” Chaffetz wrote in the letter.
However, after spending “more than 1,500 nights away” from his family — namely his wife Julie and his two kids — “I just didn’t want to do it anymore.”
“I always promised that I would get in, serve, and get out,” he said. “This is not supposed to be a lifetime appointment. I don’t want to get that Potomac fever and just get too caught up in myself or anything else … so I decided hey at the end of June we’re going to hang up our cleats at this chapter of our life.”
