Tammy Duckworth to Become the First U.S. Senator to Give Birth While in Office

Duckworth, a member of the Democratic party from Illinois, officially announced on Tuesday that she is set to deliver her second daughter this coming spring. In her statement, Duckworth said that she and her husband, Bryan Bowlsbey, are thrilled as their family is getting a little bigger, WGLT reported.

The 49-year-old senator also said that her daughter, Abigail, “is ecstatic to welcome her baby sister home this spring.”

As for being the first female U.S. senator to give birth while still serving the country, Duckworth said that “it’s about damn time.”

“I can’t believe it took until 2018. It says something about the inequality of representation that exists in our country,” the senator told Chicago Tribune.

“Men have been having children while they’ve been in office. I hope if anything comes out of the Women’s March, it’s that we get more and more women running for office. It would be good to have some company here,” she added.

Duckworth will turn 50 in March, but she doesn’t let her age bother her.

“It’s a terrible thing, but I’m listed as a geriatric mother,” the senator said in the interview. “It’s called a geriatric pregnancy on all of my medical charts. I don’t let that bother me though. I think 50-year-old moms are the new 40-year-old moms.”

Aside from the being the first senator to give birth while still in office, Duckworth is also the first ever disabled woman elected to the senate and the first member to be born in Bangkok, Thailand, according to BBC.

She reportedly lost her legs and shattered her arms in November 12, 2014 while she was serving as a helicopter pilot in the U.S. Army. Duckworth suffered severe combat wounds when the Black Hawk helicopter she was piloting at the time was shot down in Iraq during the war.

She is also the first Asian-American woman elected to congress from Illinois in 2012.

Duckworth makes sure that people with disabilities get all the help they need. And she never backs down, like the time when she claps back to Trump’s transgender military ban last year.

Featured image via Instagram / senduckworth