Senate Democrats said Thursday they have decided who will fill the three seats on the Armed Services Committee of senators defeated in the midterm elections.
Sens. Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., Joe Manchin, D-W.V., and Doug Jones, D-Ala., are set to join the committee next month as junior members while the panel starts crafting its annual defense policy bill and debates Pentagon funding levels.
Three senior Democrats on the committee — Sens. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., Claire McCaskill of D-Mo., and Joe Donnelly, D-Ind. — all lost re-election bids and their departure moves existing members up in seniority.
Duckworth, an Iraq War veteran, served on the House Armed Services Committee before being elected to the Senate in 2016. She lost her legs and part of her arm when the Black Hawk she was piloting was shot down in Iraq in 2004, and this year she became the first female senator to give birth while in office.
“My buddies in Iraq refused to leave me behind, and I want to make sure that they don’t ever regret those sacrifices that gave me a second chance at life. That’s why ever since I woke up at Walter Reed, I’ve made serving our nation’s servicemembers and Veterans my life’s mission,” Duckworth said in a statement.
Manchin, a moderate Democrat, served on the Senate Armed Services Committee previously and eked out an election victory in West Virginia despite Trump winning by a wide margin two years ago and Republicans laboring to flip the seat. He also serves on the Appropriations and Veterans’ Affairs committees.
Putting Jones, who joined the Senate this year, on the committee ensures Alabama will regain representation for its aerospace industry in Huntsville and shipbuilding industry in Mobile. The state previously had Republican Sens. Jeff Sessions and Luther Strange as members.
Jones won his seat after beating Roy Moore in a special election to fill Sessions’ old seat that drew national attention and dredged up allegations that Moore had sexual encounters with underaged women decades earlier.
