Photograph by Jeff Elkins
US Representative Jamie Raskin has become a key player in this season’s impeachment drama, serving as the lead manager of the House of Representatives’ case against Donald Trump. The congressman has repped his district since 2017, but his roots in the region extend back to the day he was born. Here’s what to know about the Maryland Democrat:
He is a DC native
Although his district is in Maryland, Raskin himself was born in
the District in 1962. Dad Marcus Raskin co-founded the progressive think tank Institute for Policy Study while mom Barbara Raskin was a journalist and a bestselling author. The congressman graduated from Georgetown Day School in 1979, where he honed his leadership skills as captain of the soccer team and editor of student newspaper
On the last awful day of the brutal year 2020, Tommy Raskin, a 25-year-old Harvard University law student, social justice activist, animal lover and poet, concluded that the pain of the world was too deep for him to be in it anymore.
He buried his son a week ago. Now Jamie Raskin is leading the impeachment charge.
Meagan Flynn and Erin Cox, The Washington Post
Jan. 12, 2021
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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., are shown at a news conference on Oct. 9, 2020.Photo for The Washington Post by Sarah Silbiger
He returned home sometime after 4 a.m. on Thursday, after Congress finished certifying the election results in the shadow of a mob invasion, and tried to get some rest. I haven t been sleeping a lot since we ve been without Tommy, Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., admitted.
It had been a week since his 25-year-old son, Thomas Bloom Raskin, died by suicide, less than two days since they buried him, and just over 12 hours since Raskin took cover with his daughter and son-in-law at the U.S. Capitol as thousands of Trump supporters ransacked the building and fatally attacked police.
Tommy Raskin, a Harvard Law student who took his own life, was buried last week in a simple Jewish graveside service. The next day, his father, Representative Jamie Raskin found himself hiding with his House colleagues from a violent mob incited by President Trump, and fearing for the safety of a surviving daughter, who had accompanied him to the Capitol to witness the counting of electoral votes to seal Joe Biden’s victory.