Rep. Cubin will not seek re-election next year

CASPER, Wyo.  — Republican Rep. Barbara Cubin, now serving her seventh term representing Wyoming, issued a statement on Saturday announcing she will not seek re-election next year.

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Cubin, R-Wyo., released a statement at a meeting of the Wyoming Republican State Central Committee.

“In contemplating 2008, my overwhelming consideration has been the need of my family for me to come home,” Cubin said. “I look forward to coming home to be a friend, a wife, a mother, and especially a grandmother.”

Cubin has missed almost half her votes in Congress this year. She has spent much of her time in Wyoming tending to her husband, who has been ill for many years with an unspecified immune disorder. Dr. Frederick “Fritz” Cubin has been hospitalized repeatedly in Casper this year, often in critical condition.

Cubin also has missed votes this year following her brother’s death and after she broke her foot. She was walking with crutches in Casper on Saturday.

“I look forward to watching a new generation of Wyoming Republicans assume the mantle of leadership in our state, and I relish the idea of never seeing another nasty headline about me again,” Cubin said in the statement.