Politicians of every stripe have traditionally offered various reasons why they will decline an opportunity to run for Congress, but Michigan’s Pete Lucido, a state senator from Macomb County, may have come up with the most unique rationale ever offered.
In an interview on Friday, Lucido (R-Shelby Township), suggested that he’s not particularly interested in running for the 10th Congressional District open seat in 2020 because, among other factors, the constant air travel required of members of Congress means that you can’t get a “pee break” on an airliner when the plane faces air turbulence.
As a state senator serving in Lansing, he can drive to work, he said on the “Friday Morning Podcast,” avoiding lines at the airport and flight delays to or from Washington faced by those serving in Congress.
“I don’t need to be belted in when I’ve got to use the bathroom,” Lucido told the podcast co-hosts, pollster Dennis Denno and longtime political pundit Bill Ballenger. “They (flight attendants) tell me, ‘We’re experiencing turbulence and you’ve got to stay in your seat right now.’
“So … everything has crossed my mind (about being a congressman), including whether I can take a pee break and go to the john.”
Instead, Lucido said that he is “absolutely” mulling a run for governor in 2022. An attorney who ran his own law firm, the bombastic senator said he would run on his “business savvy.” Gov. Whitmer, just eight months into her 4-year term, should be concerned about facing Pete Lucido for re-election, he said.
And, looking ahead, Lucido can take comfort in the fact that the governor’s office has its own bathroom.
