Jamie Raskin is a member of the United States House of Representatives. A member of the Democratic Party, he holds a seat in the 8th District of Maryland. The district includes portions of the Washington, D.C. region.
In recent years, several high-profile appointments have given Raskin a national profile. He and his family have also been dealt with some personal blows. Now apparently, including a recent health diagnosis.
He announces that he has cancer
Jamie Raskin has been diagnosed with diffuse large B cell lymphoma, reports CNN. A disease is a form of non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Common indicators of it include lumps appearing under the skin.
According to Axios, Raskin's lymphoma was detected early. He's expected to undergo a regimen of chemo-immunotherapy and has an "excellent" prognosis at this point. MedStar Georgetown University Hospital and Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center are reportedly treating him.
This marks the second time Raskin has faced a battle with cancer. He previously battled colorectal cancer.
Raskin had to have part of his colon surgically removed, along with chemotherapy and radiation treatments.
Raskin was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2016. Incumbent Democratic Representative and House Budget Committee Ranking Member Christopher Van Hollen Jr. was not running for re-election and choosing instead to make a successful run for the United States Senate.
Since then, Raskin has been elected another four times to the House. Shortly before his lymphoma announcement, he was chosen as the incoming ranking member of the House Oversight & Reform Committee. Currently, he chairs its subcommittee on Civil Rights and Civil Liberties. Raskin also chairs the Outstanding Issues Subcommittee of the House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack.
His other committee assignments include serving as vice chair of the Committee on House Administration.
In 2021, Raskin was named the lead impeachment manager for the second impeachment trial of then-U.S. President Donald Trump.
Is a former constitutional law professor
Jamie Raskin's father was the noted attorney Marcus Raskin. Marcus Raskin served as legal counsel for numerous U.S. representatives, including Wisconsin's Robert Kastenmeier and California's James Roosevelt. He also became a White House staffer and faculty member at George Washington University. The elder Raskin and Richard Barnet co-founded the Institute for Policy Studies.
The younger Raskin would graduate from Georgetown Day School before receiving a degree in government from Harvard University.
Afterward, he graduated from Harvard Law School. While there, he was a Harvard Law Review editor. Raskin would become an attorney for the National Rainbow Coalition and 1996 U.S. Presidential candidate Ross Perot.
Raskin was a longtime member of the Washington College of Law of American University faculty. Among his pupils was Stacey Plaskett. Plaskett has since been elected as a delegate to the House of Representatives from the U.S. Virgin Islands. She would become one of Raskin's fellow impeachment managers in 2021.
In 1990, Raskin married Sarah Bloom. Sarah Bloom Raskin would later join the Federal Reserve Board of Governors and become U.S. deputy treasury secretary. Earlier this year, she was nominated as a top supervisor of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors.
But she did not receive the necessary support in the Senate for confirmation. He was leading her to withdraw her name from consideration.
The Raskins have had three children. In late 2020, their son Thomas died by suicide. He was prompting his parents to take a public role in mental health awareness.