Capping off a contentious two-year stint, Rep. Cheri Bustos, the head of House Democrats’ campaign arm, has decided against running for a second term in that role, she tells TIME. Bustos had faced enormous criticism during her turn as chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which is in charge of the effort to get Democrats elected to the House. “At the start of this cycle, we understood that we had a very tough playing field and most of us expected we’d be on defense most of the cycle,” says Ami Bera, a California Democrat and one of Bustos’ deputies tasked with incumbent retention.