Midstate GOP Congressman Charlie Dent won’t seek another term

One of Congress’s most vocal moderates has announced he’s stepping down.

Pennsylvania’s 15th District representative, Republican Charlie Dent, announced late on Thursday that he won’t seek reelection next year — a decision he said he came to in mid-summer.

Dent has cut a distinct path over the course of his seven terms in Congress.

Recently, he opposed a GOP plan to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act — a move that reportedly led President Donald Trump to tell Dent he was “destroying the Republican Party.”

Dent is a co-chair of the Tuesday Group, a caucus of moderates who call themselves the “governing wing” of the Republican party. He also chairs the appropriations subcommittee on military construction and veterans’ affairs.

In a statement, Dent said he’s done his best amid “increased polarization and ideological rigidity that leads to dysfunction, disorder, and chaos.”

His departure will open a second Republican seat in Pennsylvania, making the state a likely battleground in 2018.