House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., on Thursday announced Murphy’s plans to leave Congress, effective Oct. 21. The decision comes less than 24 hours after Murphy said he would retire at the end of his term next year.
Murphy’s downfall came quickly, within days of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette publishing text messages between the married congressman and Shannon Edwards.
A Jan. 25 text message from Edwards told the congressman he had “zero issue posting your pro-life stance all over the place when you had no issue asking me to abort our unborn child just last week when we thought that was one of the options,” according to the newspaper.
A text message from Murphy’s number in response said his staff was responsible for his anti-abortion messages: “I’ve never written them. Staff does them. I read them and winced. I told staff don’t write any more.”
Edwards, it turned out, wasn’t pregnant. Murphy recently acknowledged his affair with Edwards, which became public as a result of her divorce proceedings.
The newspaper’s revelation came as the House on Tuesday approved Republican legislation that would make it a crime to perform an abortion after 20 weeks of fetal development. Murphy, a member of the House Pro-Life Caucus, is among the bill’s co-sponsors and voted for it.
On Wednesday, Murphy announced he would not seek re-election, saying he would “take personal time to seek help as my family and I continue to work through our personal difficulties.”-
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