Rep. Tom Lantos (Democrat-CA), whose district includes a small portion of southwestern San Francisco and most of San Mateo County, announced yesterday that he will not seek re-election following a diagnosis of esophageal cancer.
Congress' only holocaust survivor, Lantos twice escaped from Nazi concentration camps before making his way to the United States. In a statement yesterday, the 14-term congressman said:
It is only in the United States that a penniless survivor of the Holocaust and a fighter in the anti-Nazi underground could have received an education, raised a family, and had the privilege of serving the last three decades of his life as a Member of Congress. I will never be able to express fully my profoundly felt gratitude to this great country.As Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Lantos has taken the lead in holding the President's feet to the fire, holding over 20 oversight hearings on that debacle called the Iraq War.
My thoughts are with Lantos and his family this week.
