NPR’s Claudia Grisales interviews Rep. Jamie Raskin at his home in Takoma Park, Maryland, on June 12, 2023. Catie Dull/NPR hide caption
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Catie Dull/NPR
NPR’s Claudia Grisales interviews Rep. Jamie Raskin at his home in Takoma Park, Maryland, on June 12, 2023.
Catie Dull/NPR
Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee who has risen quickly through the ranks in the lower chamber, said Friday evening that he has decided to launch a re-election campaign to serve a fifth term as a member of congress
Raskin made the news a campaign statement issued Friday night. The move will also change the competitive race to replace outgoing Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin.
“Right now, I believe the best way for me to make the biggest difference in American politics in 2024 and beyond is this: running for re-election to the House of Representatives in the extraordinary 8th district of Maryland.” Raskin said.
Raskin had been weighing a run for the U.S. Senate after going into remission from intensive cancer treatment.
“I’ve written a speech announcing my re-election campaign for the House, I’ve written a speech announcing my candidacy for the Senate,” Raskin told NPR last month. “I understand my situation better through the process of writing.”
Raskin was first elected to the House in 2016 to represent Maryland’s 8th Congressional District. He taught constitutional law at American University for over 25 years.
In Congress, he made a name for himself as the top House manager during former President Trump’s second impeachment trial. He later served as a member of the House Select Panel on January 6 before becoming a ranking member of House Oversight.
That means he’s part of a core group of Democrats defending President Biden and his administration against Republican investigations. It’s a job expected to be more in demand as the House GOP ramps up its investigations into Biden, his administration and Democrats since Trump’s landmark federal impeachment.
“We’re still in the fight of our lives,” Raskin told NPR in a recent interview. “Donald Trump is still very much at large and we are in a fight to defend democracy and the rule of law.”
At the same time, Raskin was in another fight of his life: battling diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, a serious but curable form of cancer.
So when Cardin said in May would not seek re-election, Raskin was still dealing with the effects of chemotherapy, having undergone six rounds of treatment since his Diagnosis December 2022.
Early, Montgomery County Councilman Will JawandoMaryland Representative David Trone and Angela Alsobrooks, a Prince George’s County, Maryland official, were among the democrats launching Senate campaigns to fill Cardin’s seat.
Raskin faced a challenge that connected his more progressive Democratic position with moderate and Republican voters across the state of Maryland. He also knew he would be giving up a lot of grassroots work in the House if he left his seat.
“I’ve had friends on Capitol Hill tell me I’d be crazy to think about leaving the House, given that I won the election to be the ranking Democrat on the Oversight Committee” and build new relationships with members and staff younger people , Raskin recently told NPR. “And they can’t imagine why I would trade it for the opportunity to go to the Senate.”
In late April, Raskin received word from her medical team at Georgetown MedStar University Hospital and the nearby Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center that she was in remission, with a 90 percent chance of not relapsing.
