Former Sen. Ben Sasse’s terminal cancer is in retreat.
Eight months after he announced a stage 4 metastatic pancreatic cancer diagnosis, which Sasse admitted was “a death sentence” and candidly said he was “gonna die”, his tumors have shrunk by a remarkable amount.
“I have much, much less pain than I had four months ago when I was diagnosed, and I have a massive 76% reduction in tumor volume over the last four months,” Sasse revealed earlier this year.
The cause appears to be an experimental drug called daraxonrasib, produced by Revolution Medicines and currently in the final stages of clinical trials. Sasse, 53, enrolled in the trial after his December 2025 diagnosis revealed the cancer had spread to his liver, lungs, and vascular system. He is battling five separate cancers simultaneously.
Daraxonrasib works by targeting cell growth regulators that, when mutated, get stuck in an “on” position and continuously tell cancer cells to grow and spread. In pancreatic cancer, that mutation is present in the vast majority of tumors.
“Daraxonrasib is designed to bind [growth regulars in an] active state and turn down that signal, which can slow or shrink the cancer,” an oncologist told Fox News.
The clinical trial data is striking. Among 83 patients, the drug shrank tumors in at least 29% of participants and stopped tumor growth in more than 90%.
More significantly, it nearly doubled the survival length for patients whose cancer had already progressed past initial treatment — 13.2 months on average on the drug compared to 6.7 months on chemotherapy alone. Early data also suggests that when daraxonrasib is combined with standard chemotherapy as a first-line treatment, it is even more effective.
The drug has not cured Sasse. Doctors and Sasse himself have been clear: the improvement is real and meaningful, but it is unlikely to change his terminal prognosis.
But his tumors are smaller, his pain is reduced, and he is getting more time with his family.
“I hate cancer,” Sasse said in a recent interview. “But it’s a touch of grace because it forces me to tell the truth. And the lie I wanna tell myself is that I’m the center of everything. And I’m gonna be around forever. And I can work harder and store up enough that I can atone for my own brokenness. I can’t.”
Breitbart reported that oncologists across the country were “flooded with requests” after Sasse’s results gained national attention. The FDA is expediting the review of daraxonrasib and has opened what it calls an “expanded access” program allowing qualifying patients to use the drug before formal approval.
An estimated 67,500 Americans will be diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2026. Nearly 53,000 will die from it. For patients whose cancer has spread to distant organs, the five-year survival rate is just 3%.
Daraxonrasib won’t save everyone. But it may be the first real hope in decades for some of those patients.