Washington ? The Senate’s recruiting wars took an uncertain turn Tuesday, with Sen. Don Nickles’ retirement sending Republicans in search of an Oklahoma replacement while Democrats urged Sen. Bob Graham to run in Florida after folding his presidential bid.

“I didn’t want to be a lifer” in the Senate, said Nickles, who announced plans to retire next year after four solidly conservative terms, including six years as the second-ranking member of the GOP leadership.

Democrats hoped openly for a different decision from Graham, a proven vote-getter in his southern state for a generation. “We can all hope that he will continue to contribute his passion, experience and expertise,” Sen. Jon Corzine, D-N.J., the head of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, said Monday night after the Floridian left the presidential campaign.

Republicans hold a 51-48 majority in the Senate, with one Democratic-leaning independent. Both parties have had mixed results in their efforts at candidate recruitment in recent months.

Southern Democratic incumbents Zell Miller in Georgia; Ernest Hollings in South Carolina and John Edwards in North Carolina are retiring. All three states present Republicans with targets in a region where President Bush ran well in 2000 at the top of the ticket.

At the same time, Democrats gained an opportunity when former Gov. Tony Knowles announced he would challenge Sen. Lisa Murkowski in Alaska, and GOP Sen. Peter Fitzgerald’s decision to retire gives them another chance to gain a seat in Illinois.

The jockeying over Nickles’ seat began almost instantly.

“We are confident that his Senate seat will stay in Republican hands,” said Sen. George Allen, R-Va., who chairs the GOP senatorial campaign committee. Oklahoma has voted solidly Republican in recent presidential elections, and no Democrat has held a Senate seat from the state since David Boren retired in 1994.

Republican Rep. Ernest Istook, elected to the House in 1992, earlier indicated interest in running for the Senate if Nickles retired.