Snowe - The lone GOP health law vote - opts to not seek re-election

Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, cited the polarized climate of Congress and Washington as a key reason she will leave the Senate. Her departure renews Democrats' hope of winning this GOP seat.

The Associated Press: Maine GOP Sen. Snowe Won't Seek Re-election
With centrists becoming few and far between, Republican Sen. Olympia Snowe cited the increasingly polarized climate of Washington in abandoning the U.S. Senate after three terms, giving Democrats new hope of winning the longtime GOP-held seat. ... She was the only Republican who voted for a version of President Barack Obama's health care overhaul, joining Democrats and casting a vote for the plan in the Senate Finance Committee (Sharp, 2/29).

Boston Globe: Olympia Snowe Shocks GOP With Decision Not To Run
Olympia Snowe, a moderate Republican senator from Maine known for her ability to work across party lines on key issues affecting New England and the nation, stunned her colleagues yesterday by announcing she will not seek reelection this fall. ... During the lengthy debate over President Obama's bid to overhaul the nation's health care system, Snowe was the only Republican senator to vote for the legislation at any point; she supported the Finance Committee's version of the bill in 2009, though she did not vote for the final version (Jan and Bender, 2/28).

CQ HealthBeat: Snowe Departure Marks Exit Of Lone GOP Vote For Health Care Overhaul
The decision announced late Tuesday by Sen. Olympia Snowe that she won't run for re-election this fall marks the departure of the lone Republican in the Senate who voted for any version of the health care overhaul legislation that ultimately became law in 2010. Snowe was sympathetic to the aims of health care overhaul architects to expand coverage of the uninsured. In general she was a vote Democrats could hope to obtain for some of their proposals if they were willing to negotiate extensively and to make some adjustments. But after voting for the version of the overhaul approved by the Senate Finance Committee, she refused to vote for the overhaul on final passage (Reichard, 2/28).