Former U.S. Sen. Ben Sasse, a Nebraska Republican, is openly confronting what he describes as a “definite death sentence” after his diagnosis with metastasized stage 4 pancreatic cancer.
The father of three learned of the aggressive disease in December. Doctors initially gave him three to four months to live. In a recent interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper, conducted at his Nebraska home, Sasse reflected on the limited time remaining and his deepest regret: years spent away from his family due to constant travel.
“I have serious regret about how much I traveled,” Sasse told Tapper. He described accumulating thousands of hotel keycards from trips, a tangible reminder of missed time at home. Looking at his children, he said he felt as if they wore “a chain around their neck with an hourglass,” watching the sand of remaining family dinners slip away. “Like what the hell was I doing instead of being with you?”
Sasse left the Senate in 2023 to become president of the University of Florida before later resigning. He has chosen to spend his remaining time in public life, advocating for greater civic unity and launching a podcast titled “Not Dead Yet.”
In a social media post announcing the diagnosis, Sasse wrote that he is “gonna die” but added that he is “not going down without a fight.” He pointed to advances in immunotherapy and stressed that “Death and dying aren’t the same — the process of dying is still something to be lived.”
Sasse is enrolled in a clinical trial for daraxonrasib, an experimental targeted therapy. He has told The New York Times the drug is “nasty,” preventing his body from properly growing skin and causing widespread bleeding and a “nuclear” feeling in his face and body. Despite the harsh side effects, he reported on roughly day 99 after the initial prognosis that he is “doing a heck of a lot better than I was doing at Christmas.”
Pancreatic cancer remains one of the most difficult cancers to detect and treat. Sasse’s willingness to discuss both the physical toll and personal lessons has drawn attention as he navigates the illness publicly.
