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<\/a><\/p>\nRep. Steve Cohen gestures during a news conference in his office on Capitol Hill on May 15, 2026 in Washington, DC. (Andrew Harnik\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
In his press conference announcing his decision, the congressman also took a swipe at a Republican rival for referring to him as \u201can old, white Jewish guy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cohen, whose Memphis-area district is being splintered into three different districts, is one of a handful of Jewish Democratic casualties of the mid-decade redistricting sprint engineered to push the GOP\u2019s House advantage in this year\u2019s midterm elections.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t want to quit. I\u2019m not a quitter. But these districts were drawn to beat me,\u201d Cohen told reporters during a press conference in his Washington, D.C., office.<\/p>\n
In addition to Cohen, a cohort of three Jewish Democratic congresspeople in Florida are facing new uphill battles for reelection following that state\u2019s GOP-led redistricting. Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Lois Frankel and Jared Moskowitz have all seen their districts become more favorable to Republican challengers after the state\u2019s congressional map was redrawn.<\/p>\n
But the Tennessee state house\u2019s last-minute redrawing of Cohen\u2019s district, which is majority African-American and the state\u2019s sole Democratic U.S. House seat, has spurred the most controversy. Tennessee\u2019s 9th has one of the highest concentrations of Black voters in the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe fact that each of these new districts was drawn to divide almost exactly into thirds the Black voting population of the 9th District suggests serious racist and unethical intent and raises legal issues about the use of race being the true predominant factor in this redistricting effort,\u201d Cohen said in a statement earlier this month.<\/p>\n
Cohen has represented the district since 2006, and said he\u2019s won the support of many Black voters in Memphis despite early skepticism over whether a white candidate could effectively represent the majority-Black district.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey didn\u2019t think a Caucasian could ever win,\u201d he said. \u201cBut they underappreciated the love of the African-American people for a candidate who represented them well.\u201d<\/p>\n
The congressman left the door open for a run pending a lawsuit, filed by the Tennessee Democratic Party and other organizations, asking for a temporary restraining order on the redrawing. But he also appeared resigned to the possibility that those lawsuits would not prevail, telling reporters at his office Friday that it was \u201cthe most difficult moment\u201d of his career.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf I get the chance, I\u2019ll do it,\u201d he said. \u201cBut otherwise I\u2019ll be retiring from Congress and, I guess, from public life.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cohen also took a swipe at Tennessee GOP Rep. Andy Ogles, who, he said, \u201creferred to me the other day as \u2018an old, white Jewish guy,\u2019\u201d while defending the state\u2019s redistricting plan on Newsmax.<\/p>\n
Ogles, a hardline conservative congressman who has served Tennessee\u2019s 5th Congressional District since 2023, is currently facing a primary challenger while also remaining under scrutiny for alleged campaign finance violations tied to his campaign in 2022.<\/p>\n
\u201cWell, I guess I\u2019m old and I\u2019m Jewish and I\u2019m white. But why [did] he have to say \u2018white Jewish guy,\u2019 as distinguished from a Black Jewish guy, Sammy Davis and a few other people?\u201d Cohen mused. \u201cAs far as \u2018white Jewish guy,\u2019 does that mean there\u2019s something different among Jewish people and white people? I don\u2019t know what he\u2019s saying. He doesn\u2019t either.\u201d<\/p>\n
The other congressman from Memphis, Republican David Kustoff, is also Jewish. (They attend the same synagogue, the Reform congregation Temple Israel.) A 2010 redistricting moved most of Memphis\u2019 Jewish community, estimated at about 10,000 and including the largest Orthodox congregation in the United States, into Kustoff\u2019s district, Tennessee\u2019s 8th.<\/p>\n