What Are The Details
In an essay for the Arizona Republic, Tom Stafford, Charlie Duke, and Jack Lousma who have spent about 2,400 hours in space combined endorsed McSally and explained why Kelly is unfit for the job.
Of McSally, they wrote:
McSally delivered results for Arizona. Just look at the stats: She was ranked as one of the most bipartisan senators last year and tied for the most bills passed into law. Just this year, she introduced legislation to lower the cost of prescription drugs, started the national Veterans Treatment Courts to help improve the lives of veterans, and she helped write the legislation that gave families and small businesses help to get through the novel coronavirus. Whether its helping secure funds for Fort Huachuca, leading on the Drought Contingency Plan or getting Congress to pass land exchanges that give local control back to Arizona, Martha springs into action when her constituents reach out to her with a problem.
On the other hand, the astronauts blasted Kelly, writing that having astronaut on your resume does not mean youd be a good U.S. senator.
Mark Kelly is hoping Arizonans are so impressed with his background that they ignore the fact that hes supported radical gun control activists, that his plan for the eventual government takeover of health care would end Medicare as we know it, and that hed vote to raise our taxes, they wrote.
What Is The Background
Kelly is running against Sen. Martha McSally in a close race to take control of the seat that was left vacant by McCains death two years ago. Sen. Jon Kyl , McCains appointed successor, resigned in late 2018, and McSally was appointed to occupy the seat, taking office in January 2019.
The race is critical for Republicans, who are fighting to maintain their majority in the Senate. Republicans essentially hold a three-seat majority, and they cannot afforded to cede ground to Democrats.
The race has taken on even more importance in the wake of Ruth Bader Ginsburgs death. If Republicans cannot confirm Ginsburgs successor, Amy Coney Barrett, quickly enough, the party may have one less vote in Barretts favor.
Thats because McSally and Kelly are competing in a special election to fulfill the final two years of McCains term. If Kelly wins, he could be seated as soon as Nov. 30 not in January 2021 like all other election winners.
Could Kelly Win Liberal Base In Primary
Democratic candidates stances on Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, and income equality are emerging as the new litmustests for progressives.
Kelly has not talked at length about those two issues but has put the need to address climate change front and center of his Senate roll-out, and Democrats have applauded his pledge to not accept donations from corporate political-action committees.
Regardless of whether there is an intense primary, Kelly is already working to brand himself as a problem-solver and collaborator who doesnt approach issues through partisan lenses.
Still, Kellys 2012 participation in the Republican primary almost certainly will be weaponized by both Republicans and Democrats.
But if he makes it to the November 2020 general election,Kelly could use his GOP history to his benefit as an indicator of his independence and willingness to cross party lines.
Thats a little disturbing, said Dan ONeal, a retired teacher who lives in Gilbert and is the state coordinator for Progressive Democrats of America. We support people who are strong on our issues, and if he was voting as a Republican at one point, that would cause us to certainly be concerned, and wed like to sit down and talk to him.”
Were Kelly to win the primary election, those affiliated with the progressive group are going to support him for sure, ONeal added.
During her last race, McSally leaned into Trump and his policies while aggressively attacking Sinema.
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Former Astronaut Takes Arizona Senate Seat
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Former astronaut has ousted Arizonas incumbent Republican senator as the parties jockey for the upper chambers gavel.
Mr Kelly, who is married to former congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, will be one of two Arizona Democrats in the Senate, with Mr Kelly filling a seat once held by former GOP presidential candidate John McCain.
Mr Kelly secured the seat with 53.4 per cent of the vote, according to Associated Press. He won some 179,000 more than votes than his rival.
His win as Democrats hope to push closer to a majority in the Senate follows Democratic presidential candidate Joe Bidens victory in Arizona, which Donald Trump carried in 2016.
It’s the second election night contest in which a Democrat beat a GOP incumbent. The other was in Colorado.
Early Life And Education
Scott Kelly was born, along with his identical twin brother Mark, on February 21, 1964, in Orange, New Jersey, to Patricia and Richard Kelly. Kelly’s family lived in West Orange, where his parents worked as police officers. Kelly and his brother graduated from West Orange Mountain High School in 1982. While in high school, Kelly worked as an emergency medical technician in Orange and Jersey City, New Jersey.:32â41
After graduating from high school, Kelly enrolled at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. During his freshman year, Kelly read The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe, and was inspired to pursue a career in naval aviation.:40â41 After his freshman year, Kelly transferred to State University of New York Maritime College, where he received a Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps scholarship. During the summer after his freshman year, Kelly sailed aboard SUNY Maritime’s training ship, Empire State V, and stopped in Mallorca, Hamburg, and London. After his sophomore year, Kelly sailed again on Empire State V.:55â66 He served as the student battalion commander for his school’s Navy ROTC detachment, and graduated with a Bachelor of Engineering degree in electrical engineering in 1987.:107â110 Kelly later earned a Master of Science degree in aviations systems from the University of Tennessee.
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Former Astronaut Mark Kelly Increases Lead Over Republican Martha Mcsally To Finish John Mccain’s Senate Term New Poll Shows
Democratic candidate Mark Kelly has widened his lead over his Republican rival, Arizona Senator Martha McSally, according to new polling.
Kelly, a former NASA astronaut, is now 7 points ahead of McSally, who was appointed to her Senate seat after the death of Republican John McCain in 2018. McSally, an Air Force veteran, previously ran an unsuccessful campaign against Democratic Senator Kyrsten Sinema in 2018. Whoever wins in November, Kelly or McSally, will serve out the remainder of McCain’s six-year term, which began in 2017.
The new poll, which was conducted by Phoenix-based OH Predictive Insights, found that Kelly’s lead over the GOP senator had grown significantly since December. Kelly scored 49 percent, compared with McSally’s 42 percent, in the latest survey. This past December, the difference was only 3 points, with Kelly at 47 percent and McSally at 44 percent.
Newsweek has reached out to McSally’s campaign for comment but did not hear back before publication.
“The race between Republican Senator Martha McSally and Democratic challenger Mark Kelly could attract upwards of $200 million, including outside spending,” Mike Noble, chief of research and managing partner at OH Predictive Insights, predicted in a press release.
Ballot Processing Pima County
An election worker scans a ballot while doing the first check of the signature while processing ballots at the Pima County Elections Office located at 6550 S Country Club Rd, on Nov. 4, 2020. If the signature matches what the office has on file the ballot will move on to be counted. If the signature does not match it will be moved to a special desk where workers investigate the signature by following up with the voter.
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Thiel Ally’s Entrance Kicks Off Protracted Gop Senate Fight In Arizona
Arizona is one of Senate Republicans’ top targets in 2022, but they will have to fight through a year-long primary first.
Sen. Mark Kelly greets supporters during Election Night 2020. He will have to defend his seat in 2022. |
07/12/2021 07:10 PM EDT
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The Republicans running to turn back Democratic gains in Arizona and flip a critical Senate seat next year will have to fight through a protracted, expensive primary first.
The race to face Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly has swelled with new Republican entrants in recent weeks with the latest, Peter Thiel associate Blake Masters, officially launching his campaign Monday.
Masters, a 34-year-old executive for the billionaire tech investor’s firm, is backed by a $10 million super PAC investment from Thiel, and he is one of three first-time candidates in a Republican primary that also includes state Attorney General Mark Brnovich, who has twice been elected statewide, as well as businessman Jim Lamon and retired Maj. Gen. Michael McGuire.
Arizonas Republican Party has been riven by deep divisions for more than a decade, and Democrats have capitalized on that by winning key statewide races with less than 50 percent of the vote in the past two elections. Now, the crowded, cash-flush Senate primary all but assures that Republicans will be fighting over who their nominee will be for more than a year, while Kelly, who narrowly won in 2020, rakes in cash and consolidates his position.
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A Look At The Claims:
NATIONAL REPUBLICAN SENATORIAL COMMITTEE: In Tucson, Mark Kellys company promised 400 jobs to get $15 million bucks from taxpayers. That promise? Just hot air.”
THE FACTS: Thats a misrepresentation of a deal that Pima County government officials struck with World View, which makes and uses high-altitude balloons that collect data from above the Earths surface.
Rather than hand over money to the company from taxpayers, Pima County offered to build a new headquarters, manufacturing facility and launch pad in order to entice the company to stay, when it was considering relocating from Tucson, Arizona, in 2016.
The county agreed to spend up to $15 million plus $5 million in interest over time on the new facilities. World View didnt get the new digs for free. It pays rent to the county.
Four years into the deal, World View has so far paid over $2.3 million to Pima County, according to John Moffatt, the county’s economic development director. By the time World Views 20-year lease is up, it is scheduled to have paid the county more than $23 million for rent, according to county documents reviewed by The Associated Press.
World View, however, hasnt met the rosy job projections the company initially made when the county offered to build its headquarters.
Its constant, Moffatt said of TV ads running about World View in the Senate race. And they continue to misrepresent. Pima County gets painted black with this too.
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Democrat Mark Kelly Flips Republican Senate Seat In Arizona
PHOENIX Democrat Mark Kelly won the Arizona Senate seat once held by John McCain, riding Arizonas changing electorate to flip a Republican Senate seat in a state long dominated by the GOP.
Arizona will send two Democrats to the Senate for the first time in nearly 70 years when Kelly joins Kyrsten Sinema in Washington.
Kelly, a former astronaut, defeated Republican Martha McSally, who was appointed to the seat by GOP Gov. Doug Ducey after McCains death in 2018.
In his first run for political office, Kelly positioned himself as a pragmatic centrist with no patience for Washington partisanship. When the coronavirus pandemic struck, he retreated to mostly online outreach, minimizing face-to-face campaigning while blasting McSally and President Donald Trump for allowing the pandemic to get out of control.
The work starts now. And we desperately need Washington to work for Arizona, Kelly told a small group of family and reporters gathered for his victory speech in Tucson. My top priority is making sure we have a plan to slow the spread of this virus, and then getting Arizona the resources our state needs right now.
Kelly flew four space shuttle missions and leaned heavily on his NASA background in campaign ads and speeches, but hes perhaps best known in Arizona as the husband of former Democratic U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who was shot in the head in an assassination attempt during a constituent event in Tucson in 2011.
Arizonas Political Odd Couple Reveals Two Distinct Paths For Democrats
Despite being from the same party and same state, Senators Kyrsten Sinema and Mark Kelly give differing answers as to how party might keep power
When Democrat Mark Kelly was sworn in to office late last year it marked the end of a nearly 70-year drought of Arizona being represented by two Democrats.
But since then Kelly, a former astronaut, and his counterpart senator, Kyrsten Sinema, have plotted decidedly different paths in the Senate. Despite being from the same party and the same state and representing the same electorate, the pair of Arizona Democrats have become a sort of political odd couple.
The twists and turns that each Arizona Democrat took to get into office and the moves they are making to retain their seats reveal two distinct paths Democrats can take to win and retain tough Senate seats. But they can also give differing answers as to how Democrats might keep power, or even extend it.
Sinema, a longtime Arizona lawmaker and former Democratic member of the House of Representatives, has carved out a reputation as one of the most conservative members of the Democratic caucus in the chamber. Her name is almost synonymous with Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia and bucking the Democratic party on key sticking points.
Sinema has split with her fellow Democrats on a minimum wage hike to $15 and support for an overhaul to the legislativefilibuster. Among the press corps she is also notorious for avoiding virtually all interviews.
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Arizona’s Mark Kelly Is Sworn Into Senate Narrowing Gop Edge
Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., with his wife former Rep. Gabby Giffords, D-Ariz., participates in a re-enactment of his swearing-in Wednesday, Dec. 2, 2020, by Vice President Mike Pence in the Old Senate Chamber on Capitol Hill in Washington.
WASHINGTON Arizona Democrat and former astronaut Mark Kelly was sworn into the Senate on Wednesday, narrowing Republican control of the chamber and underscoring his state’s shift from red to blue.
Kelly, 56, defeated GOP Sen. Martha McSally in last month’s election, making her one of only three incumbents to lose. By taking office, he has reduced the Republican edge in the chamber to 52-48.
That will have scant impact on Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s control over the chamber for the final month of this congressional session. But it sets the stage for two pivotal Jan. 5 Senate runoff elections in Georgia.
If Democrats win both, they will command the 50-50 chamber for the new Congress that begins in early January because Vice President-elect Kamala Harris would cast tie-breaking votes.
Kelly cast himself as a problem-solving centrist during his campaign, and his slender 2 percentage point victory over McSally suggests he’ll want to be part of Democrats’ moderate wing. In a written statement after taking office, he invoked the “independence” of the late Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who sometimes crossed party lines and whose seat he now holds.
“Great day, excellent day,” Giffords told reporters afterward.
Former Astronaut Mark Kelly Is Sworn In To Us Senate
Senator Mark Kelly, a former astronaut, joined the Senate on Wednesday, becoming one of just two Democrats to unseat a Republican incumbent this year.
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Do you solemnly swear that you will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic that you will bear true faith and allegiance to the same that you take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion and that you will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which youre about to enter: So help you God? I do. Congratulations, Senator.
Senator Mark Kelly is no stranger to lonely missions.
As a former astronaut, he traveled millions of miles in space piloting shuttles to the International Space Station on four different missions, one of them just months after an assassination attempt nearly claimed the life of his wife, former Representative Gabrielle Giffords.
On Wednesday, he began another kind of lonely journey, becoming the first of a new class to be formally sworn into the Senate and one of just two Democrats to unseat a Republican incumbent this year. Last month, Mr. Kelly won a special election to serve the remainder of the late Senator John McCains term.
Everyone continues to be inspired by Gabbys recovery, by Marks devotion, and the courage it took for their family to re-enter public life and public service, Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the minority leader, said on Wednesday.
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Relation To Marital Status And Parenthood
Americans that identify as single, living with a domestic partner, divorced, separated, or widowed are more likely to vote Democratic in contrast to married Americans which split about equally between Democrat and Republican.
General Social Surveys of more than 11,000 Democrats and Republicans conducted between 1996 and 2006 came to the result that the differences in fertility rates are not statistically significant between these parties, with the average Democrat having 1.94 children and the average Republican having 1.91 children. However, there is a significant difference in fertility rates between the two related groups liberals and conservatives, with liberals reproducing at a much lower rate than conservatives.
