A Democratic candidate vying for the congressional seat in California currently held by Rep. Michelle Steel (R-CA) has suspended his campaign—and he was refreshingly honest about why. “Life is short,” Aditya Pai, a 31-year-old Harvard-educated attorney, wrote in an email shared on Twitter by a reporter. “I believe one should enjoy their work. For the past four months, I have not enjoyed mine.” While Pai described his campaign in positive terms, with success in fundraising, canvassing all parts of district CA-45, and spreading “a service message that resonates here in a purple district,” he admitted “my heart is not quite in it.” “I love the subject matter dearly: politics, law, policy, government. I love helping people. But at least at this moment, I don’t enjoy the life of a politician,” Pai said. “And were I fortunate enough to be elected, I am now certain, I would be unhappy in Congress.” Besides a general “lack of joy,” Pai did not go into specifics on what changed his mind. Pai’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Daily Beast.
