Former Astronaut Mark Kelly Announces Campaign for US Senate

Former NASA astronaut Mark Kelly announced today (Feb. 12) that he is running for a seat in the U.S. Senate in Arizona. The special election in 2020 will determine who will take over for the late Sen. John McCain and finish out the last two years of the six-year term. 

Kelly, a Democrat, announced his campaign in a video on Twitter in which he spoke about his family, his career and the policy issues that drive him the most, like gun control, affordable health care, job growth and climate change. 

Before he became an astronaut, Kelly was a U.S. Navy captain. From 2001 to 2011, he flew four space shuttle missions. He is also known for his participation in NASA's twin study with his identical brother, Scott Kelly, who spent nearly a year in space while Mark Kelly served as a the "control" back on Earth. The goal of the yearlong study was to examine how long-term spaceflight affects the human body. [Twins in Space: NASA's Mark and Scott Kelly (Photos)]  

Four months before Mark Kelly's fourth and final shuttle mission, his wife, Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, was shot in the head during a mass shooting that killed six and wounded 12 others at a public event in Tucson, Arizona. 

Kelly and Giffords have since been staunch proponents of gun-control legislation. In 2013, they created a political action committee called Americans for Responsible Solutions to spark a national conversation about "balanced" solutions to gun violence, or solutions that would preserve gun owners' Second Amendment rights while limiting the influencing power of the National Rifle Association (NRA). 

"I learned a lot from being an astronaut. I learned a lot from being a pilot in the Navy. I learned a lot about solving problems from being an engineer. But what I learned from my wife is how you use policy to improve people's lives," Kelly said in the video.

After retiring from NASA to help his wife recover from the shooting, Kelly became a bit of a political activist. But that's not all this former astronaut has been up to in the past eight years. Kelly has authored several children's books, including the "Mousetronaut" series (Simon & Schuster, 2012) and "Astrotwins" (Simon & Schuster, 2016).

Email Hanneke Weitering at hweitering@space.com or follow her @hannekescience. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.