Tammy Duckworth is set to become the first US senator to give birth while in office.
Despite there being other women who have given birth while serving in Congress, Duckworth - who is due to girth birth shortly after she turns 50 in April - will be the first to do so while sitting in the Senate (not the House).
Duckworth is making a wave of firsts during her time in office. She is the first ever disabled woman to be elected to the Senate, after she lost her legs while serving as a US army pilot.
She is also the first member of the Senate to be born in Thailand.
When asked how it felt to be the first woman who will give birth while serving in the Senate, she told Chicago Tribune: “Well, 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.”
Duckworth continued: “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.”
Duckworth already has three-year-old daughter called Abigail with her husband Bryan Bowlsbey.
She also opened up about her and her husband’s fertility struggles, sharing that she had multiple IVF cycles and a miscarriage.
Earlier in January 2018, New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced she was pregnant. The 37-year-old politician’s pregnancy was one of the very few examples of an elected leader holding office while pregnant and the first in New Zealand’s history.
Pakistan’s Benazir Bhutto gave birth while she was prime minister in 1990.
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