Well the stated cause of his 'death' was his brain tumor, and we know that was being set up as his 'out' card…
So we have a character on the stage with a public out card that just used it, and I because it was being set up as an out card, that means he values his life enough to think that far ahead..
He didn't die.
Yet.
It's a smart move.
If a bishop is getting trapped pull them out and get them back into the shadows so he can be resigned or redeployed across the world.
It burns the power he wielded in that Senate seat but.. NOW THE SEAT IS OPEN.
Then, if indeed he's still alive, when his ugly face is shown on TV in cuffs the rest of what revelations are to come will be all the more believable.
Those were collisions between two American ships.
Their GPS signals, or the reading of them, was… tampered with.