U.S. Rep. Raúl Grijalva of Tucson is planning to close out a five-decade career in elective office, saying he won’t run again in 2026 assuming he’s reelected next month.
“For all intents and purposes, this is the last term,” Grijalva said in a phone interview Tuesday with Arizona Daily Star columnist Tim Steller.
Grijalva, a Democrat, is running for his 12th term in the U.S. House of Representatives, against Tucson Republican Daniel Butierez.
Grijalva reported in April that he has cancer. He has missed hundreds of votes since leaving Washington, D.C., to seek treatment. In July, he told the Star he had lung cancer but that he was recovering well from chemotherapy and radiation treatments. On Tuesday, he sounded like his normal self as he talked politics.
Grijalva spoke on camera Monday with KOLD Channel 13’s longtime reporter Bud Foster, who first reported his decision not to seek reelection.
“I think 22 years is pretty good, it’s a retirement age,” the 76-year-old Grijalva told Foster. “Not that I’m abandoning what I do now. It’s time for someone else. It’s time for someone younger.”
Grijalva told the Star he expects to serve out the next term if he wins.
“I have good strength right now. I have clarity, acuity — I like that word, I learned it the other day,” he joked. “All I have ahead of me is physical therapy, and I feel good about that. It’s not severe physical therapy.”
That physical therapy is focused on his right leg, he said.
Grijalva’s decision will end a half-century in elective office that started in 1974 when he first was elected to the Tucson Unified School District board. He served on the board from 1975 through 1988.
He then served on the Pima County Board of Supervisors for nearly 14 years, representing Tucson’s west side and many of its inner-city barrios in District 5 — a seat now held by his daughter, Adelita Grijalva.
He was first elected to Congress in 2002, and has won reelection handily most times from his heavily Democratic district. His only close race came in 2010, when he won during a year of heavy Republican gains in Congress in which he drew criticism for advocating a boycott of Arizona after it enacted a highly restrictive anti-immigration measure — most of which was later tossed out in court.
In Congress, he was chair of the House Natural Resources Committee from 2019 through 2022. He is now its ranking Democrat.
Grijalva
Throughout his career, he has made a major mark as an unstinting advocate for immigrants and Latinos, Native Americans and other people of color. He has also been an outspoken environmentalist.
“I’ve known and admired Raúl since we were in our 20s when I worked for Mo Udall and Raúl was a community leader on the south side,” said Terry Bracy, a longtime aide to the late Congressman Mo Udall of Tucson. “From that day forward, Raúl dedicated his life to helping the poor and helpless.”
Grijalva became “a leader of the liberals” in Congress, Bracy said, and eventually, as chair of the Natural Resources Committee, “brilliantly continued the environmental work in a room named in honor of his predecessor,” Udall. Bracy also called Grijalva “a public servant of historical importance.”
As a county supervisor, Grijalva was instrumental in pushing through the Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan, which has saved at least 200,000 acres of ecologically sensitive lands as open space through land acquisition and conservation easements.
In Congress, he has been a vocal opponent of the proposed Rosemont and Copper World mines in the Santa Rita Mountains southeast of Tucson, and a forceful advocate for action on climate change issues, among many others. He’s fought particularly hard for pollution cleanups and other measures that many advocates consider environmental justice issues.
“There is no better nor more effective friend of the environment than Rep. Grijalva,” said Kevin Dahl, a Tucson City Council member and former longtime environmental activist. “As chair or ranking member of the House Natural Resources Committee, he has played a crucial role in passing most of the conservation and environmental justice bills in recent years.
“In Arizona, the establishment of the Ironwood Forest National Monument, Santa Cruz River National Heritage Area, the new Grand Canyon monument and the expansion of Saguaro National Park, would not have been possible without his leadership,” said Dahl, who was Arizona senior program manager of the National Parks and Conservation Association for 14 years before his election to the council as a Democrat in 2021.
The League of Conservation Voters ranks Grijalva’s voting at “an incredibly high” 97%, Dahl said.
On Tuesday, Grijalva said to the Star of his current race, “The campaign is about turnout. We want to concentrate on getting turnout up high.”
“The higher the turnout, the better we do. Not just myself, but Democrats.”
Asked about how he created the progressive movement he leads, Grijalva said, “It’s been stubbornness. It’s also been introducing a political philosophy that people got comfortable with.”
People, he said, like Tucson Mayor Regina Romero, his daughter Pima County Supervisor Adelita Grijalva, and state legislator Betty Villegas, as well as members of the Tucson City Council.
“That’s what I’m proud of. It’s not a one-person legacy. You have to extend it,” he said.
Grijalva said he does not have a favorite candidate to replace him if he wins this election.
“No, that would be presumptuous at this point,” he said. “We haven’t even finished this election.”
Butierez and his wife Paula, who manages the GOP campaign, noted that Grijalva didn’t attend the Arizona Clean Election Commission debate or other events that the two candidates were invited to speak at.
“I’d rather run man to man and face him,” Daniel Butierez said. “He should be out speaking to the community. I’d like to confront him and ask him questions.”
Speaking before Foster’s interview with Grijalva, Paula Butierez said, “We’re running a campaign against a ghost.”
