Crucial Quote
“I don’t even know the details, and I respect that. It’s members’ personal privacy on whatever matters they’re dealing with,” House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said Wednesday, adding he last spoke to Kean on the phone “a few weeks ago.”
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Tangent
Rep. Frederica Wilson, D-Fla., had also been absent from Washington for weeks until she voted Thursday for the first time since April 17. She released a statement, hours after Forbes and other outlets published articles about her absence earlier this month, that said she’s been unable to fly since having surgery on her left eye. She has said she still plans on running for reelection. Wilson, 83, was elected in 2010 and ran uncontested in her most recent primary in 2024. She represents a solidly blue district, but she’s being challenged in the August primary by small-business owner Christine Sanon-Jules Olivo.
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Key Background
Kean, 57, is running uncontested in the June 2 primary. He flipped the seat from blue to red when he was first elected to the House in 2022, and he won reelection in 2024 by six points. There are signs the district could shift back to Democrats’ control, including Democratic Gov. Mikie Sherrill’s win over Republican Jack Ciattarelli by two points there in November. Kean has a prominent political lineage dating back to the Revolutionary War. His father, Thomas Howard Kean, served two terms as New Jersey governor from 1982-1990, and his grandfather, Robert Kean, represented New Jersey in the House for 20 years. He is a descendant of the state’s first governor, William Livingston; the Stuyvesant family of Dutch colonial settlers who were original landowners in New York; and of John Winthrop, the first governor of Massachusetts.
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Further Reading
2 House Members Have Been Absent For Weeks, Missing Dozens Of Votes (Forbes)