Arizona's McSally endorsed by Buzz Aldrin

FPI / October 27, 2020

Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin has endorsed Arizona Republican Sen. Martha McSally over Democrat Mark Kelly, who is a former astronaut.

In a nod to McSally’s service as a U.S. Air Force fighter pilot, Aldrin, also a retired Air Force pilot, used "FTR lingo" in encouraging McSally to wave as she passes Kelly in the Senate race.

"12 o’clock is straight ahead. 6 o’clock is behind. Fighter pilots understand what 'check six' means in FTR lingo talk.
Martha, wave as you move ahead past Mark, to 12 o’clock, and you win for Arizona!" said Aldrin, who is one of the 12 Americans who have walked on the moon.

McSally said it is an “absolute honor to have the support of hero astronaut Buzz Aldrin in this mission. We must hold this seat, the Senate, and save the country. It’s a dog fight, and as we fighter pilots say: Fight’s On!”

Aldrin's endorsement comes several weeks after former astronauts Tom Stafford, Charlie Duke, and Jack Lousma penned an op-ed endorsing McSally.

The astronauts said Kelly is campaigning on the hope that voters are “so impressed with his background that they ignore the fact that he’s 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 he’d vote to raise our taxes.”

“McSally has delivered for Arizona, while Mark Kelly embraces Democrat ideology that would be bad for our country — leaving us with less freedoms, less security and less control of our lives,” the former astronauts wrote on Oct. 5.

The National File news site recently published images from a yearbook dating to the mid-1980s which purportedly show Kelly dressed as Hitler for Halloween. Kelly and his campaign called the article false.

Free Press International