Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell gained his third challenger Thursday in what is expected to be a hotly-contested U.S. Senate race in 2020.
Democrat Mike Broihier, a farmer and retired Marine lieutenant colonel, made his announcement in a campaign video, saying McConnell “refined the art of obstruction” and “weaponized the filibuster to his own political purposes.”
“We deserve a U.S. senator who sees beyond the labels, who actually cares about us, who listens to us, who sees us and respects us as individuals,” Broihier says in the video. “Mitch McConnell doesn’t.”
According to a biography provided by Broihier’s campaign, he served in the Marines for more than 20 years before retiring in 2005 when he moved to Kentucky to become a farmer.
He also served as a reporter and editor for the Interior Journal, a small-town Kentucky newspaper.
Broihier’s campaign website describes the former Marine as a fighter for “economic justice and equality on behalf of all Kentuckians.”
He joins former fighter pilot Amy McGrath and healthcare advocate Steven Cox in the Democratic primary. McGrath was the Democratic nominee for Kentucky’s 6th Congressional District in 2018 but narrowly lost to Republican incumbent Andy Barr. McGrath raised $2.5 million in the first 24 hours of her campaign bid, but she has since had a rocky few weeks to start her campaign.
