Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), 79, announced that he will not seek re-election in 2024 after his third term in the Senate. He has held the seat since 2006.
In a five-and-a-half-minute video that he released announcing his retirement, Cardin’s wife Myrna said, “We use the expression tikkun olam, ‘repairing the world.’ We use it a lot. It’s in our DNA. And I love the way you’ve taken that from our family to Annapolis to Washington. It undergirds so much of what you do.”
“You were my inspiration,” Cardin told his wife, “when you headed the Maryland committee for Soviet Jewry and helping Soviet Jews, as I was going on to Washington to the House of Representatives.”
“Had to come home every night and tell you what I was doing for Soviet Jews,” he said.
Cardin also talked in the video about how tzedakah, or charity, informed his approach to the environment. The Jewish senator is a longtime member of the modern Orthodox synagogue Beth Tfiloh Congregation in Pikesville, Md.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), 89, and Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), 73, have also said they won’t seek re-election next year.
“We are grateful for your work to strengthen the U.S.-Israel relationship, support Holocaust education, and combat antisemitism,” tweeted the Orthodox Union Advocacy Center.
