GREENVILLE, S.C. (AP) — Former 4th District Rep. Trey Gowdy is joining a South Carolina law firm now that his Congressional term is over.

Nelson, Mullins, Riley & Scarborough said Thursday in a news release that Gowdy is joining their staff and will work in Greenville and Washington, D.C.

Gowdy did not seek re-election to the seat he held for eight years.

He told The Greenville News he has no plans to return to politics, either as an elected official or a lobbyist.

"If I enjoyed politics, I wouldn't be leaving," said Gowdy, who represented Greenville and his home county of Spartanburg for eight years.

Gowdy will be part of the firm's White Collar Defense & Government Investigations team. He'll focus on internal and government investigations and corporate compliance.

"There are scores and scores of investigations that are not criminal in nature," he said. "They're never going to lead to criminal charges, but you still want to find out what happened."

The former chairman of the U.S. House Oversight and Government Reform Committee lead the Congressional investigation of former presidential candidate Hilary Clinton and the terrorist attacks in Benghazi, Libya.

The Benghazi investigation and the Robert Mueller investigation into Russian involvement in the 2016 election are examples, he said, of political bias that drove him to retire from office.

"In politics, because our country is so divided and so polarized, for the most part people have already made up their minds," he said. "If you value the art of persuasion, there's not much persuasion to be done."

Gowdy returns to private practice for Nelson Mullins, which he left in 1994 to join the U.S. Attorney's Office, where he served as a federal prosecutor until 2000 before running for the state's 7th Circuit Solicitor.

Former Greenville state Senator William Timmons was elected in November to replace Gowdy in Washington.

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Information from: The Greenville News, http://www.greenvillenews.com