Former UF President Ben Sasse announced his stage 4 pancreatic cancer diagnosis in a post made on X Tuesday morning.
The 53-year-old decided to share after his friends, to whom the post was addressed, “started to suspect something.” He wrote the cancer is terminal and “metastasized,” meaning it has spread beyond his pancreas, and the diagnosis came last week.
“Death is a wicked thief, and the bastard pursues us all,” he said.
A former Nebraskan Senator, Sasse served as UF’s President for 17 months, beginning February 2023, before his resignation in July 2024. The resignation came after his wife Melissa Sasse received an epilepsy diagnosis.
After his presidency ended, Sasse retained president emeritus status and continued teaching as a professor at UF’s Hamilton School for Classical and Civic Education. It's unclear whether he will continue his role as a professor following the diagnosis. He is currently scheduled to teach one Spring 2026 class, "The American Idea," according to UF's course search.
Sasse wrote his diagnosis is hard as a husband, father and “someone wired to work and build.”
“I’ve got less time than I prefer,” he wrote.
In a joint statement provided to The Alligator, UF Board of Trustees Chair Mori Hosseini and Interim UF President Donald W. Landry extended their "sincerest thoughts and prayers" to Sasse and his family.
“We were shocked and saddened by the news of President Sasse’s illness. This was staggering news," the statement said. "And yet, true to his character, Ben’s first instinct is to give comfort and reassurance to those of us who have known and admired him."
Sasse's post commemorated people in his life, particularly his wife and their three children, the youngest of whom is 14 years old.
In the post, Sasse wrote he and his wife have grown closer in the past year, and he listed some of his children’s recent accomplishments. There is no optimal time to tell “your peeps” about the diagnosis, Sasse said, but the hope brought by Christmas advent makes the present not “the worst.”
Sasse added he is “not going down without a fight.”
“The process of dying is still something to be lived,” he said.
As his family faces the treatment to come, he wrote, they wish readers peace. The post was signed from “Ben — and the Sasses.”
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
Contact Maria Arruda at marruda@alligator.org. Follow her on X at @mariazalfarruda.
Maria is the Fall 2025 student government reporter for the Alligator. She's a sophomore journalism and political science major at UF and hopes to work as a political correspondent one day! Maria loves to read, hang out with her friends, see her family and go to the gym in her spare time.
