WASHINGTON (AP) – Senate Judiciary Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., announced Wednesday that he has Hodgkin’s disease but expects to continue to work in the Senate while being treated.

“I have beaten a brain tumor, bypass heart surgery and many tough political opponents and I’m going to beat this, too,” Specter said in a statement.

Hodgkin’s disease is a type of cancer involving the lymph nodes. Specter will receive chemotherapy every two weeks for up to 32 weeks at the Abramson Cancer Center at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, a release from his office said.

Specter’s doctor, John H. Glick, said he has an “excellent chance of being completely cured.” Specter, a 75-year-old Pennsylvania moderate who just won re-election to his Senate seat, became Judiciary chairman in January. Specter also has undergone two hernia operations is less than two years.

He had to briefly delay a December trip to the Middle East to schedule the minor surgery.

Specter is the first Pennsylvanian elected to five Senate terms, but his 2004 victory was the toughest of his career. Specter barely defeated a conservative former congressman in an April 2004 primary in a race where his age was contrasted with that of his youthful-looking opponent. However, Specter handily won the general election in November.

Intellectual and prickly, Specter is one of a dwindling breed of moderate Republicans in an increasingly polarized Senate. He plays squash nearly every day and likes to unwind with a martini or two at night.

Specter has been absent all week and will miss Thursday’s Judiciary Committee meeting, in which senators are expected to vote on a bankruptcy measure. The Senate leaves Friday and does not return until March 1, when the Judiciary Committee holds its first hearing on President Bush’s judicial nominees.

Specter fought to be Judiciary chairman earlier this year after right-wing Republicans pushed to have him replaced with a more conservative GOP senator. He has promised to be a strong advocate for all of Bush’s judicial nominees.

Even without Specter, Republicans have enough votes to push Bush’s judicial nominees out of committee. The GOP holds a 10-8 advantage on that committee.

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Associated Press Writer Lara Jakes Jordan contributed to this report.

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On the Net:

Sen. Arlen Specter: http://specter.senate.gov

AP-ES-02-16-05 1829EST