Washington: Rep Patrick Kennedy has decided not to seek re-election to Congress, saying his life is "taking a new direction."
Kennedy taped a message to be aired on television in Rhode Island on Sunday night. The Associated Press viewed the message ahead of the announcement.
The decision by the eight-term congressman comes less than a month after a stunning Republican upset in the race for the Massachusetts Senate seat his late father, Edward Kennedy, held for almost half a century.
Patrick Kennedy has been in and out of treatment for substance abuse since crashing his car outside the U.S Capitol in 2006. Still, he has been comfortably re-elected twice since then, after making mental health care his signature issue.
PTI
First Published: Friday, February 12, 2010, 10:56