GOP Congressman Dan Bishop to leave Congress, run for North Carolina attorney general in 2024

Freedom Caucus member and North Carolina GOP Rep. Dan Bishop said Thursday he plans to run for state attorney general in 2024 instead of seeking reelection for his House seat. 

Bishop, a lawyer, made the announcement on a radio show in his home city, Charlotte, North Carolina, while Congress is on summer recess. 

"Over the course of many months we decided this is the right thing for me to do, to come back to North Carolina," Bishop reportedly said on WBT radio about him and his wife. "I think there’s an opportunity to use the influence of that office to restore law and order to our cities."

In 2019, Bishop narrowly won a special election to join Congress.

He reportedly wants to return to law and if elected help GOP attorneys general who have been fighting back against what they consider the federal government's overreach.

Bishop is running for the seat of being vacated by Attorney General Josh Stein, a Democrat who is running in 2024 for governor.

"I really intended to go to Washington and to do what people expected me to do – to be a reliable voice for them, to be a fighter for them," Bishop said in the radio interview. "This is another way to do the same fight very much on a different stage."