US Rep. Jennifer Wexton (VA-10) introduced on Monday that she is not going to search reelection in 2024 and can retire from politics to take care of a devastating new medical prognosis.
In April, Wexton introduced that she had been identified with Parkinson’s illness, however she deliberate to proceed to serve Virginians as she sought remedy and hoped to make use of her platform to advocate for incapacity rights.
However quickly the northern Virginia Democrat realized her signs weren’t enhancing with remedy, so she sought second and third medical opinions. Over the summer season, she acquired a definitive, devastating prognosis: progressive supranuclear palsy.
“I’ve all the time believed that honesty is an important worth in public service, so I need to be sincere with you now – this new prognosis is a tricky one,” Wexton stated in a press release on Monday. “There is no such thing as a ‘getting higher’ with PSP. I’ll proceed remedy choices to handle my signs, however they don’t work as nicely with my situation as they do for Parkinson’s.”
This uncommon neurological dysfunction mimics Parkinson’s signs in its early levels, however it usually responds poorly to remedy, progresses extra quickly, and has no remedy.
Wexton initially sought remedy and remedy within the hope that she may see important enchancment in her signs. However after an intense regiment in the course of the August recess didn’t produce the outcomes she hoped for, Wexton realized she wouldn’t “have the ability to deal with the trials of campaigning in a tricky district,” as she described it.
Earlier than her election to Virginia’s tenth congressional district in 2018, the previous trial legal professional served in Virginia’s state Senate for 5 years. A mom of two, she says she’s most happy with the legal guidelines she helped go within the Normal Meeting that assist victims of revenge porn, regulate daycare facilities, and safe girls’s proper to breastfeed in public.
“Once I made the choice to run for Congress, this was clearly not the way in which I anticipated it coming to a detailed — however then once more, just about nothing about my time serving right here has fairly been typical or as anticipated,” stated Wexton. “I’ll perpetually cherish the folks from our communities and throughout the nation I’ve come to know, the challenges we’ve confronted collectively, and the methods each huge and small that my workforce and I’ve made a distinction within the lives of our neighbors.”
