#ryan zinke

Republican Ryan Zinke Leaving Congress: What We Know

PUBLISHED

MAR 02, 2026 AT 04:02 PM EST

UPDATED

MAR 02, 2026 AT 05:40 PM EST

Tom Schaller at Public Notice (03.20.2026):

Earlier this month, four more Republicans announced their pending retirements from the House of Representatives: Darrell Issa (CA-48), Tony Gonzales (TX-23), Burgess Owens (UT-4), and Ryan Zinke (MT-1). Their decisions to retire raised to 34 the number of House Republicans not seeking reelection this November. Entering Donald Trump’s second presidential midterm, those 34 vacancies are tied for the most GOP House retirements in a midterm cycle during the past 100 years. What year shares the record? Answer: 2018, Trump’s first midterm cycle. That November, Trump lost his House majority when the Democrats flipped a net of 40 seats. And 2026 is not over yet: More House Republicans could still announce they are packing it in. Most of these Republicans are not retiring from politics entirely. Twenty-one are giving up their seats to seek other offices; of these, 20 are running for either US Senate or governor. The twenty-first is GOP firebrand Chip Roy, who announced his retirement to run for Texas attorney general. (Roy is in a runoff with state Sen. Mayes Middleton to be party’s nominee.)

To be clear, 21 Democrats have also announced their retirements, so the pattern is hardly one-sided. And the departure of the embattled Gonzales, whose sordid affair with a female staffer led to her suicide, is probably more of a blessing that a liability for House Speaker Mike Johnson and his Republican colleagues, some of whom have called upon Gonzales to resign immediately.

But retirements are significant because they can serve as both a symptom and a cause of a bad cycle for the party suffering most of them. Why? Because even though most House districts are strategically gerrymandered to provide safe seats for one party or another, rookie candidates are qualitatively different from veteran incumbents. These candidates often must spend a lot of resources winning a contentious primary, and tend to have fewer connections and lower name-recognition with district constituents.

Incumbents aren’t just a surer bet to hold a seat for their party, but a less expensive one, too. Open seats force the so-called “Hill committees” — the Republican National Campaign Committee (RNCC) and Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) — to spend resources they would prefer to dedicate to other contests.

Still, what matters more than who is retiring and whom the two parties will nominate to fill vacant seats is how competitive those open districts might be in the general election. With Johnson’s razor-thin House majority, any and every advantage for either the Republican RNCC or the DCCC is crucial. (California Rep. Kevin Kiley’s recent declaration that he has left the GOP and filed for reelection as an independent gives Johnson yet another headache.)

He is a sitting member of Congress.

Rep. Ryan Zinke (R-MT) claimed Monday that he believed President Donald Trump's spending bill would ultimately pass once it heads back to the House, and that it will include an 80-hour-a-month work requirement for Medicaid recipients.

CNN host Pamela Brown pressed Zinke about how he'll be able to justify the Medicaid work provision to his constituents.

How does one apply for a permit to export trophy republican politician or republican donor body parts out of the country? That should be the quid pro quo for this lion permitting process.

Excerpt:

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has issued more than three dozen permits for hunters to bring back lion trophy parts from Zimbabwe and Zambia between 2016-2018, according to copies of the permits obtained by a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request.

The documents were obtained by Friends of Animals and reported by Huffington Post on Thursday. Thirty-three hunters received a total of 38 lion trophy permits, according to the animal advocacy nonprofit.

More than half of those hunters donated to Republican lawmakers or have ties to hunting advocacy group Safari Club International, Friends of Animals said.

"The permits show that the current administration, not only has loosened restrictions on lion hunting, but is rewarding supporters," the nonprofit said in a press release.

Last year, Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke created an advisory committee called the International Wildlife Conservation Council (IWCC) that is mainly comprised of trophy hunters and members of Safari Club International.

Among the hunters who received a permit was Steven Chancellor, a wealthy Indiana businessman and major GOP donor who raised more than $1 million for Republican candidates at a fundraiser at his home headlined by Donald Trump in 2016, Friends of Animals said. Chancellor—an avid hunter who has registered 482 confirmed kills, including 18 lions, between 1980 and 2008, the Courier & Press reported—is an appointee on Sec. Zinke's International Wildlife Conservation Council. He was allowed to import lion parts from a July 2016 hunt in Zimbabwe, according to the FOIA request.

Another hunter who received permits was Virginia resident Kent Greenawalt, who has donated more than $100,000 to Republican candidates and committees and $5,400 to Trump. He was allowed to bring back lion trophies after a hunt in Zambia in 2017 and another hunt in Zimbabwe in 2016, Friends of Animals revealed.

Friends of Animals (link) tells us that other recipients of these lion trophy import permits are:

The data received by FoA shows that the greatest number of permits issued went to hunters from Texas whose residents received a dozen total. Other big GOP donors who received permits were Thomas Whaley of Marshall, Texas, and Justin Hedgecock of Gallatin Gateway, Montana. Whaley, who has given thousands of dollars to Republican candidates and the Republican National Committee, received two permits for lion hunts. Whaley received the permits for hunts in 2018 and 2017 and he also received a permit to import an elephant trophy from Zimbabwe in 2017. 

Philip Glass, a Texas rancher who is the focus of the film “Trophy” that depicts his $100,000 lion killing safari exploits in Zimbabwe and who donated $800 to Trump, also is among the U.S. hunters who received permits.

Thomas Zulim of Hockley Texas, also a GOP donor, received two permits for lion trophies for hunts in Zimbabwe in 2016 and 2017. The other Texas hunters who obtained permits are Amanda Henson, Fred Rich, Robert Hixon, Daniel Welker, Mark Pease, Jason Webster, Jeffrey Smithers, Oscar Taunton and Cooper Ribman, a teenager who received the Dallas Safari Club 2018 Young Hunter Award. Ribman’s permit was paid for by his Dallas Safari Club sponsor, Trevo Ahlberg, a major GOP donor, who owns a payday loan company and is a big game hunter.

Stephen Crooks of Stanton, Michigan and Lawrence Patrick Rudolph of Paradise Valley, Arizona also received two permits for lion trophies. The others who received permits were Dan Huber of Sulfer Springs, West Virginia; Dan Ongna, of Stevens Point, Wisconsin; William Katen, of Patchogue, New York; Richard Bodkin of Remsendburg, New York; Anthony Turiello of Santa Cruz, California; David Asai of Farmville, Virginia; John Wilson of Parkville, Missouri; Jon Dagel of Florence, South Dakota; Kelly Keithly of Yuma, Arizona; Timothy Haley of Palo Alto, California; Eric Rau of Union, Missouri; Andrew Cook of Honeoye Falls, New York and James Horrocks of Highland, Utah.