Southern Arizona Congresswoman Martha McSally Running For Senate

Congresswoman Martha McSally shakes hands with supporters on Jan. 12, 2018, after announcing her intention to run for the U.S. Senate when Sen. Jeff Flake leaves office.
Michel Marizco
January 12, 2018

EDITOR'S NOTE: This story contains graphic language.

Arizona Congresswoman Martha McSally announced her intention to run for the senate seat at a plane hangar in Tucson on Friday morning.

She wore a flight suit, her uniform from her days as the country’s first female combat pilot, and she spoke about her record of fighting the Department of Defense over the clothes women in the military were forced to wear in restrictive countries practicing Sharia law.

About 100 voters turned out to applaud her ambition. 

"On illegal immigration, i support the strategy of control over our border. by more agents, sensors, aerial assets, manned and unmanned and every other effective means including a border wall.

McSally didn’t blanch over President Donald Trump’s reported remarks about immigrants from Haiti, El Salvador and African countries Thursday coming from what he called "shithole countries."

"Let me just say, I speak a little salty behind closed doors at times as well and so I am not going to throw the first stone on using any language. I guess there is a dispute over what was actually said. And look, I don’t think we should be having any comments about, you know, specific countries personally, but the issue I think he is trying to get to is we’ve got to reform our immigration system."

McSally has largely backed the president's push for severe border enforcement in exchange for the reinstatement of a form of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA).

Earlier this week, United States Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen applauded McSally and other members of the House Homeland Security Committee Border and Maritime Security subcommittee for introducing a bill that would provide a solution to keeping the DACA program alive, but would also reduce visa overstays and threatens to punish sanctuary cities.

McSally is running off the platform that, right now, only she — and not her Republican rivals Kelli Ward and Joe Arpaio are actually in office attempting to pass legislation.