Ben Sasse

Midland Lutheran College

Sasse was announced as the 15th president of Midland Lutheran College in October 2009. At 37, he was one of the youngest chief executives in American higher education when he took over leadership of the 128-year-old institution in spring 2010. Sasse's grandfather, Elmer Sasse, had worked for Midland as vice president of finance. The school was experiencing financial and academic difficulties; Sasse has been credited with "turn[ing] it around", rebranding "Midland Lutheran College" as Midland University, instituting new policies (including spot quizzes and class attendance), and "prodigious fundraising".

Sasse was installed as president on December 10, 2010. When he was appointed, enrollment was at a historic low and the college was "on the verge of bankruptcy". During his tenure as president, enrollment grew from 590 to 1,300 students. When nearby Dana College was forced to close, Sasse hired much of its faculty and enabled most of its students to transfer to Midland.

When Sasse announced his intention to run for U.S. Senate, he offered to resign his post at Midland Lutheran College. Instead, the board asked him to stay under a partial leave of absence; in October 2013, his employment contract was amended to reduce his pay. After winning the Republican primary election, Sasse announced that he would step down as president of Midland Lutheran College, effective December 31, 2014.

University of Florida

In autumn 2022, the University of Florida Board of Trustees and the Florida Board of Governors selected Sasse as the 13th president of the University of Florida. He was the sole finalist out of 12 interviewed candidates for this position. Sasse assumed the presidency of the University of Florida on February 6, 2023. He succeeded Kent Fuchs as president.

Sasse's appointment generated some controversy on campus, with Sasse's past comments on same-sex marriage leading to student protests. The university's Faculty Senate also passed a no-confidence resolution expressing concern for the lack of transparency surrounding Sasse's selection.

On July 18, 2024, Sasse announced that he would be resigning from his position at the university effective July 31. He cited his wife Melissa's "recent epilepsy diagnosis and a new batch of memory issues" as reasons for his resignation. The University of Florida stated that it would continue to pay his $1 million annual salary through February 2028.

During his presidency, Sasse tripled the budget of his office to $17.3 million, $7.2 million of which was directed to consulting contracts. The president's staff increased from under 10 people to 30. The new hires included former Senate staffers and other Republican officials, many of whom worked outside Florida, resulting in increased travel costs. Sasse's office spent $1.3 million on catering at dinners and social functions, double the rate spent by his predecessor. The most expensive event was $177,000 on catering and drinks for a 200-person holiday party. An audit conducted by the Florida Auditor General found Sasse inappropriately spent university funds, including by paying above-market-rate salaries to his former congressional staffers who were not competitively hired and by chartering private jet flights without clear business purposes.

After stepping down as president, Sasse continued to teach classes at the university's Hamilton Center, a "GOP-mandated civic program devoted to research and teaching about Western civilization and the principles of a free society" according to The Independent Florida Alligator.

Illness

On December 23, 2025, Sasse announced that he had been diagnosed with terminal "stage-four pancreatic cancer". In April 2026, during an interview with The New York Times, Sasse revealed that his cancer had spread to his liver, lymph nodes, lung and vascular system. Due to receiving the cancer treatment daraxonrasib, he had visible facial scarring. However, he also stated that the drug has helped shrink his tumors by 80%.

Donald Trump

Sasse is known as a prominent Republican critic of Donald Trump.

In early 2016, during both major parties' presidential primary election seasons, Sasse announced that he would not support Trump should Trump become the party's nominee; he was the first sitting senator to make such an announcement. Sasse questioned Trump's commitment to the U.S. Constitution, in particular accusing him of attacking the First Amendment; stated that Trump had refused to condemn the Ku Klux Klan; and suggested that Trump "thinks he's running for King". He stated that if Trump won the party's nomination, he would vote neither for him nor for Hillary Clinton, but would probably "look for some third candidate—a conservative option, a Constitutionalist". Sasse suggested that he might leave the Republican Party, saying, "if the Republican Party becomes the party of David Duke, Donald Trump, I'm out".

Asked about Sasse's third-party suggestion, Trump replied, "That would be the work of a loser." Several Nebraska Republican politicians, among them State Senators Bob Krist and Beau McCoy and U.S. Senator Deb Fischer, took exception to Sasse's statements. Krist called them "very immature" and said that Sasse should "quietly and in a statesmanlike manner allow the system to work out and provide the leadership that needs to be provided"; Fischer said that voting for a third-party alternative would produce a Clinton victory. Krist later switched his registration to the Democratic Party, running as its candidate in the 2018 Nebraska gubernatorial election.

In September 2017, Sasse said he thought about leaving the GOP "every morning" and said he thought of himself as "an independent conservative who caucuses with the Republicans". Sasse has called Trump a "megalomaniac strongman", has "called the president's tariffs on steel and aluminum imports 'dumb'", and "has described Trump's escalating trade war with China [as] 'nuts'".

In March 2018, Sasse criticized Trump for congratulating Vladimir Putin on his election victory, saying, "The president of the United States was wrong to congratulate him, and the White House press secretary was wrong to duck a simple question about whether or not Putin's reelection was free and fair. It was not. The American people know that, the Russian people know that, and the world knows that. The White House refused to speak directly and clearly about this matter; we were weakened as a nation, and a tyrant was strengthened."

In July 2018, Politico reported that Sasse had "quietly launched a new political non-profit group, fueling speculation that he might launch a Hail Mary bid for president rather than seek another term in the Senate". But Politico also reported that Sasse and Trump were talking multiple times each month.

In January 2019, Sasse was one of 11 Republican senators to vote to advance legislation intended to block Trump's intent to lift sanctions against three Russian companies.

Sasse has been criticized for lambasting Trump but voting in line with his positions. Dick Polman of WHYY criticized Sasse as "all talk, no action", saying that Sasse and other Republicans in Congress "continue to abet and excuse Donald Trump's relentless assaults on democratic norms and the rule of law". Jennifer Rubin, in The Washington Post, wrote that Sasse and Republicans "now face voters increasingly upset about corruption and abuse of power, both of which will not abate so long as spineless Republicans hold the majority in both houses".

Sasse voted to acquit Trump in his first impeachment trial in the Senate over his request of Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy that he start an investigation into political rival Joe Biden. Sasse said, "It's clear that the president had mixed motives in his decision to temporarily withhold military aid from Ukraine. The line between personal and public was not firmly safeguarded." He added that removing Trump from office would be bad for the country in the long term and that "removal is the wrong decision". During the impeachment trial, Sasse voted not to call witnesses to testify.

In August 2020, Sasse again came into conflict with Trump when Sasse referred to Trump's executive order authorizing stimulus after Congress failed to agree on a second COVID-19 relief package as "unconstitutional slop". Trump responded by calling Sasse a RINO (Republican In Name Only) and saying that Sasse had "gone rogue".

In an October 2020 campaign town hall event, Sasse remained critical of Trump: "He mocks evangelicals behind closed doors. His family has treated the presidency like a business opportunity. He's flirted with white supremacists." He added, "The United States now regularly sells out our allies under his leadership" and criticized Trump for "the way he treats women". Sasse expressed concern that Trump's "stupid political obsessions" and "rage tweeting" alienate voters.

In December 2020, when Trump pardoned many people connected to himself, Sasse said, "This is rotten to the core."

Sasse acknowledged Joe Biden's win in the 2020 presidential election and condemned Trump's efforts to overturn the election results. He was the first Republican to criticize Senator Josh Hawley's plan to challenge the results during Congress's count of the electoral votes on January 6, 2021, saying such an action would "disenfranchise millions of Americans" and that it would "point a loaded gun at the heart of legitimate self-government".

Sasse was participating in the January 6, 2021 certification of the 2021 United States Electoral College vote count when Donald Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol. In response, Sasse held Trump responsible for the storming of the Capitol, asserting that Trump "delighted" in the attack and was a "broken man".

Sasse voted to certify Arizona's and Pennsylvania's electoral votes in the 2020 presidential election.

Sasse was the first Republican senator to publicly support the second impeachment of Donald Trump. He stated that he was willing to consider articles of impeachment because Trump had violated his oath of office in relation to the January 6 United States Capitol attack. After the House of Representatives voted to impeach Trump for the second time, Sasse joined six other Republican senators in voting to convict Trump on February 13, 2021. On May 27, 2021, along with five other Republicans and all present Democrats, he voted to establish a bipartisan commission to investigate the January 6 Capitol attack. The vote failed for lack of 60 required "yes" votes.

In February 2021, the Lincoln County Republican Party censured Sasse for his comments about Trump's impeachment. The county chair lamented that state law did not allow Sasse to be recalled. When the Nebraska Republican Party considered censuring Sasse for his lack of support for Trump, Sasse responded, "Politics isn't about the weird worship of one dude."

According to FiveThirtyEight, Sasse voted in line with Trump's position 84.8% of the time, less than the majority of his Senate Republican colleagues.

Environment

Sasse has criticized what he calls "alarmism" over climate change and has said, "you don't hear a lot of people who put climate as a No. 1 issue... offering constructive, innovative solutions for the future". He has said that "innovation" is the solution to climate change.

Guns

Sasse has said he could support "red flag" gun legislation only if it protects the constitutional rights of gun owners, doesn't take away guns without due process, and is limited to people who are convicted of domestic violence or other crimes.

LGBT+ rights

Sasse does not support same-sex marriage. After the United States Supreme Court ruled that it was unconstitutional for a state to ban same-sex marriage in Obergefell v. Hodges, Sasse said, "Today's ruling is a disappointment to Nebraskans who understand that marriage brings a wife and husband together so their children can have a mom and dad. The Supreme Court once again overstepped its Constitutional role by acting as a super-legislature and imposing its own definition of marriage on the American people rather than allowing voters to decide in the states." In November 2022, he abstained from voting on the Respect for Marriage Act which codified same-sex marriage rights into federal law.

Foreign policy

China

Huawei's CFO Meng Wanzhou, daughter of the company's founder Ren Zhengfei, was arrested in Canada on December 1, 2018, at the request of U.S. authorities. Sasse said that China is undermining U.S. national security interests, often "using private sector entities", and "Americans are grateful that our Canadian partners have arrested the chief financial officer."

In May 2020, Sasse delivered a graduation speech to the graduating class of 2020 at Fremont High School in Nebraska, his high school alma mater, in which he criticized China over the COVID-19 pandemic. The local newspaper Omaha World-Herald reported that his remarks drew criticism from Sasse's Democratic opponent and a board member of Fremont High School who endorsed Sasse's Democratic opponent. The public school board also issued an official statement and disavowed its responsibility for Sasse's comments. A spokesperson for Sasse defended the remarks, reiterating Sasse's criticisms and saying that students were mature enough to hear the truth.

Ukraine

After the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Sasse spoke in favor of expanding American military assistance to Ukraine, saying, "If [Ukraine] can shoot it, we should ship it."

Sasse, who served on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, has criticized what he considered unnecessary roadblocks in supplying actionable intelligence to the Armed Forces of Ukraine, saying, "There are a bunch of technicalities about intelligence in general versus targeting information in particular. And we should be giving the Ukrainians all the intelligence we can possibly get them as fast as possible. It's way too lawyerly. We have a very limited window here."

Sasse does not support direct U.S. military intervention in the conflict, saying, "We don't need to have fighter pilots in the air, we don't need to have boots on the ground inside Ukraine, because Ukrainians have the will to fight. We need to have the will to rearm them constantly."