On this date one year ago, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” unveiled its original profile of Martha McSally, the junior U.S. Senator from Arizona, a position to which she was appointed by shady-as-hell Arizona Governor Doug Ducey, after the predictable resignation of Senator Jon Kyl in early 2019, who himself was appointed to finish out the six-year term that John McCain was elected to in 2016. The fact that she is now a Senator defies most respect for Democracy, considering Arizona voters rejected the thought of her as their Senator in the 2018 elections, choosing Democrat Kyrsten Sinema over her after she spent almost two years sucking up to Donald Trump and adopting his racist demagogue stances. It was one thing(including fear-mongering about MS-13 and calling for a border along the U.S./Mexico border, but Martha McSally actually was caught up in xenophobic euphoria that she called for a border wall to be built between Arizona and California, too.
As McSally began to trail behind Sinema in polls, she started pushing a disgusting barrage of campaign ads where McSally claimed that Sinema’s anti-war protests against the Bush administration’s invasion of Iraq in 2003 featured her “denigrating the troops” (Sinema’s criticism was for the war pigs ordering the invasion, not the brave Americans asked to carry it out). That still failed to put Mcsally in the lead, and as final polls began to show that McSally would end up on the losing end of the race and allow Arizona to have a Democratic senator for the first time in decades, she responded with a Hail Mary, accusing Sinema of “advocating for treason” in their debate in October of 2018. Because accusing your opponent of a capital offense is totally reasonable.
Martha McSally was never a candidate the people of Arizona rallied behind, as even with a gerrymandered map helping her try and win Arizona’s 2nd Congressional District in the House of Representatives, she still lost in 2012, and even in the 2014 elections with Republican tail winds behind her, she only won over Democrat Ron Barber by 161 votes. She inspires the people of Arizona so much that she got caught during the campaign using sock-puppet accounts to post compliments to herself. She has a U.S. Senate seat for now… but will have to defend it in a special election 2020 just in order to finish the term that was originally won by John McCain
in 2016 to last until 2022 (more on who she will face in November 2020 later).
McSally’s voting record so far in the Senate shows she’s on pace with the conservative extremism that embodies the Republican caucus over the past decade:
Since arriving in the Senate, McSally has continued to rubber-stamp every Trump appointee who comes in front of her, no matter how unqualified, for every judge’s seat, ambassador post, or other Cabinet position. She was already unloved at the polls, but now as an incumbent, maybe momentum would swing in her favor?
Heh heh. NO. Martha McSally is already shaking in her boots at the prospect of facing former NASA astronaut Mark Kelly. If McSally couldn’t beat a Democratic candidate like Kyrsten Sinema, against Mark Kelly… even her attack strategy of using her military service as a fighter pilot to attack her opponent as “treasonous” isn’t just moot, it’s dwarfed by the guy who has that on his resume, and then went on to go into space. They were polling dead even a year ago, with and McSally has firmly placed herself as an acolyte of Donald Trump… whose fortunes have decidedly taken a turn for the worse in polls throughout 2020 so far. Which leaves McSally scrambling to try and crawl back to the center in Arizona, and tethered to all the stupid decisions Trump makes that affect her state, like say, threatening Mexico with tariffs that would cripple Arizona’s economy.
And then there was Sen. McSally’s moment where she let her mask slip, and showed everyone how bitter and petty she truly is. Manu Raju, a reporter for CNN, was asking McSally her opinion on if the Senate should consider new evidence in the impeachment trial and she dismissed him with sheer contempt, saying:
”You’re a liberal hack. I’m not talking to you. You’re a liberal hack.”
So now she’s embraced Trump enough to start attacking the media. Outstanding. She had the nerve to try and spin the incident as if she was the victim, doubling down and saying she called him a hack because “it’s the truth”, and that the media reacting to her disgusting behavior was somehow just sexism directed at her because she’s a woman and not supposed to say things like that. Revolting. Man or woman, it’s inappropriate. But it’s revolting to mock the media with that defense.
Martha McSally as the lead candidate for U.S. Senate in two consecutive elections looks to result in the Republican Party seeing both of Arizona’s seats in the Senate flip blue, a feat that seemed impossible only a few years ago. Historic precedent for a losing candidate to avenge a loss in a Senate race two years later among candidates since 2002 is not good, with any candidate from either party attempting it losing, and all getting less of a percentage of the vote than they did in their prior attempt. McSally only garnered 47% against Sinema, and looks to be going far lower of a percentage against Mark Kelly. Recent polls have her down double-digits, potentially losing this time by as much as 13 points. Trying to claim Mark Kelly is puppet of the Chinese government in campaign ads without any explanation might have something to do with that.
Democrats are almost definitely going to end up with Mark Kelly in John McCain’s old Senate seat. We will now throw back our heads and laugh for the next hour, if you’ll excuse us.
One Year Ago, June 14th, 2019: Martha McSally (AZ)… Original Profile
Two Years Ago, June 14th, 2018: Bill Fawell (FL)
Three Years Ago, June 14th, 2017: John McCain (AZ)… 2017 Update
Four Year Ago, June 14th, 2016: John McCain (AZ)… 2016 Update
Five Years Ago, June 14th, 2015: John McCain (AZ)… Original Profile