艾米·麦格拉思在肯塔基州两次闪电般地与参议院多数党领袖米奇·麦康奈尔展开了她整个竞选活动的对冲——也就是说，一名民主党人与一名非常不受欢迎的共和党现任者对抗并获胜。

这位44岁的前海军陆战队员指望麦康奈尔不受欢迎——民调显示他是这个国家最不受欢迎的议员之一——在今年11月将他的席位变成蓝色。毕竟，对共和党州长马特·贝文的深深不满足以让他在2019年被赶下台。

“肯塔基人知道他不在乎他们，他们希望他离开。他们厌倦了他，”麦格拉思在接受采访时谈到麦康奈尔时说新闻周刊。

“我认为反对不受欢迎的现任者，民主党可以在这里获胜。这就是州长竞选的结果。米奇·麦康奈尔在这里不受欢迎。”

但麦康奈尔不是贝文。这位78岁的共和党领袖是国会山最有权力的立法者，唐纳德·特朗普总统的得力助手，也是政治上最多产的筹款人之一。

此外，对他领导能力的蔑视从未阻止他赢得连任。自1984年进入国会以来，他已经连续六届连任。2014年，肯塔基州最后一位与他竞争的民主党人以15个百分点的优势落败。

尽管如此，麦格拉思还是把自己的受欢迎程度作为一种方式来下注。她认为，麦康奈尔已经玩了他的牌太多次，向肯塔基人“一次又一次”表明，他“比他的选民更关心自己的政党和自己的权力”。

她将在2018年中期选举中脱颖而出成为候选人。麦格拉思凭借一个突出其兵役和家庭背景的病毒性传记广告登上了全国舞台。她是第一位在战斗任务中驾驶F-18的女性海军陆战队队员。她的母亲是小儿麻痹症的幸存者，是首批从肯塔基大学医学院毕业的女性之一。尽管她最终在国会的竞选中输给了共和党人安迪·巴尔，但她以不到3个百分点的优势落败——这表明即使在贝文下台之前，民主党人在这个深红的州也能表现出色。

参议院少数党领袖查克·舒默(Chuck Schumer)亲自招募她去对抗麦康奈尔(McConnell)，并得到了众议院最大的筹款机构——民主党参议院竞选委员会的支持，这也没什么坏处。他们的支持，加上她的筹款和在民意调查中的地位，表明她可能是11月份最强大的对手。

今年早些时候进行的调查显示，她要么和麦康奈尔打成平手，要么落后他一位数。一项变革研究民调显示，两位候选人在潜在选民中的支持率僵持在41%。加林-哈特-杨的另一项调查显示，麦康奈尔领先3个百分点——尽管他的胜利在民调的误差范围内。

麦格拉思也证明了她在筹款方面可以和麦康奈尔匹敌。根据最新的竞选财务数据，从1月到3月，她比现任者高出500万美元。就手头的总现金而言，两者仅相差几千美元:麦康奈尔目前在银行的存款为1490万美元，而麦格拉思为1470万美元。如果麦格拉思赢得民主党提名，他们的竞选预计将是2020年周期中最昂贵的。

“麦康奈尔参议员过去总是获胜，因为他有更大的号角声。他总是比他的对手多几千万美元，”麦格拉思说。“我们的筹款活动表明，我们有大量的基层支持。这是米奇·麦康奈尔以前从未反对过的。”

她的竞选团队表示，自从麦康奈尔成为联邦政府应对冠状病毒大流行的代言人以来，他们已经筹集了更多的资金。仅在4月份，麦格拉思就获得了500万美元的捐款。她的团队表示，在麦康奈尔发表煽动性言论，让各州破产，而不是给他们更多的财政救济后，大量现金流入。

“这只是纯粹的麦康奈尔，”麦格拉思谈到参议员对冠状病毒大流行的处理时说。这不是恭维。

她认为，他的一些失败包括搁置第一轮立法，以确保制药公司可以虚报冠状病毒疫苗的价格。她还批评了麦康奈尔在历史性的2万亿美元关怀法案中所包含的税收变化，该法案主要惠及百万富翁，并对联邦援助中给予大中型企业的5000亿美元缺乏监管。麦格拉思称该救助项目为大公司的“贿赂基金”。

“然后当州政府和地方政府——他们主要雇佣我们的消防员、警察、医疗保健工作者、教师——说我们需要帮助时，米奇·麦康奈尔会怎么做？他说，“好吧，你们应该破产。”我是说真的？“麦格拉思说。”我们永远不会谈论参议员麦克格雷斯所说的任何关于州和地方政府应该破产的事情。我从来没想过。"

但在她能够直接挑战麦康奈尔的参议院席位之前，她必须在6月23日通过该州的民主党初选。她的两个最大的竞争对手包括迈克·布罗伊希尔，一个农民，海军陆战队的退役中校，和查尔斯·布克，一个来自路易斯维尔的州议员。

这两人对麦格拉思施压，说他不够进步。布罗伊希尔形容她的平台是“空的”。布克说，民主党参议员竞选委员会支持她的决定“完全不尊重肯塔基州人民”

尽管麦格拉思在2018年的竞选中声称自己比肯塔基州的任何人都“更进步”，但她在很大程度上一直停留在竞争对手向左跳的中间位置。她支持奥巴马医改，但不支持单一支付者医疗保健体系，如全民医保。她支持收入平等，但不如布克和布罗伊希尔，他们支持每月全民基本收入。

麦格拉思挡开了她进步对手的批评，实事求是地说她是一个“常识性的肯塔基民主党人”，能为居民做事。

2018年11月6日，在肯塔基州里士满的EKU艺术中心，艾米·麦格拉思在她竞选之夜的失败后向支持者发表演讲。麦格拉思正在竞选参议员多数党领袖米奇·麦康奈尔。

如果麦格拉思能够在民主党初选中胜出的话，留在中间可能是她获胜的策略。她2018年的竞选是在一个更加紫色的选区，而肯塔基则是红色的:2016年，特朗普获得了超过30分。由于总统在今年的选举中处于领先地位，很难想象一个候选人在赢得参议院席位的同时没有赢得他的支持者。

但是麦格拉思的温和方法偶尔遇到了阻碍，因为她在某些问题上的不一致招致了两党的批评。去年，她对最高法院法官布雷特·卡瓦纳的评论引起了人们的热议。首先，她说她会支持他的确认。几个小时后，她收回了这句话。

麦格雷斯的任何闪失都可能被麦康奈尔抓住，他的连任策略几乎总是包括对他的对手进行攻击。2014年，他花了3000多万美元在广告上反对他以大比分击败的对手。在他最近一次全州范围的广告攻势中，麦康奈尔抨击麦克格拉斯利用冠状病毒危机花费“数百万美元进行虚假的党派攻击”

”麦格拉思用连自由派报纸都称之为虚假的谎言来加剧恐惧。但当艾米·麦格拉思撒谎时，米奇·麦康奈尔却领先，”一则广告说。

麦格雷斯在麦康奈尔的广告战中坚持自己的立场，拒绝停止播放剪辑，即使参议院多数党领袖在冠状病毒大流行期间呼吁停火。自2019年夏天——离11月大选还有整整一年——以来，两人已经在广播和电视节目上花费了数百万美元。

“我已经建立了一个团队，能够以他需要被打败的方式来对付他。我们正在努力做到这一点，”麦格拉思说。

“我们可以把他弄出来。我们实际上可以做一些非常实际的事情，帮助人们的生活，让肯塔基人的生活更美好，这就是我的全部。”

MITCH MCCONNELL'S OPPONENT AMY MCGRATH IS COUNTING ON HIS UNPOPULARITY TO OVERCOME LONG-SHOT ODDS IN SENATE RACE

Amy McGrath is hedging her entire campaign against Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on lightning striking twice in Kentucky—that is, a Democrat going up against a deeply unpopular Republican incumbent and winning.

The 44-year-old former Marine is counting on McConnell's unpopularity—polls show he's one of the single least-liked lawmakers in the country—to turn his seat blue this November. After all, deep dissatisfaction with Republican Governor Matt Bevin was enough to get him ousted from office in 2019.

"People in Kentucky know that he doesn't care about them and they want him gone. They're tired of him," McGrath said about McConnell during an interview with Newsweek.

"I think against an unpopular incumbent, a Democrat can win here. That's what the governor's race showed. And Mitch McConnell is not well-liked here."

But McConnell is no Bevin. The 78-year-old Republican leader is the most powerful lawmaker on Capitol Hill, President Donald Trump's right-hand man and one of the most prolific fundraisers in politics.

Plus, disdain for his leadership has never stopped him from winning re-election. He's served six straight terms since entering Congress in 1984. The last Democrat to go up against him in Kentucky lost by a 15-point margin in 2014.

Still, McGrath is betting on her own popularity as a way in. She argues that McConnell has played his hand one too many times, showing Kentuckians "over and over again" that he "cares more about his own political party and his own power" than his constituents.

She's coming off a star-making candidacy from the 2018 midterm election cycle. McGrath was catapulted to the national stage on the strength of a viral biographical ad highlighting her military service and family background. She was the first female Marine to fly an F-18 in a combat mission. Her mother, a polio survivor, was one of the first women to graduate from the University of Kentucky College of Medicine. While she ultimately lost the congressional race to Republican Andy Barr, she was defeated by less than 3 points—an indication that Democrats could perform well in the deep-red state even before Bevin's downfall.

It also doesn't hurt that she has been personally recruited by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer to go up against McConnell and has been backed by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, the largest fundraising operation for the chamber. Their support, plus her fundraising and standing in the polls, shows she could be the most formidable opponent come November.

Surveys conducted earlier this year showed her either tied with McConnell or trailing him by single digits. A Change Research poll had the two candidates deadlocked at 41 percent support among likely voters. Another survey from Garin-Hart-Yang showed McConnell ahead by 3 percentage points—although his victory was within the poll's margin of error.

McGrath has also proven she can match McConnell in fundraising. She outraised the incumbent by $5 million from January to March, according to the latest campaign finance data. In terms of overall cash on hand, the two are separated by just a few thousand dollars: McConnell currently has $14.9 million in the bank compared with McGrath's $14.7 million. Their race, if McGrath wins the Democratic nomination, is expected to be the most expensive of the 2020 cycle.

"Senator McConnell has always won in the past because he's had a bigger blow horn. He's always had tens of millions of dollars more than his opponent," McGrath said. "What our fundraising shows is that we have a tremendous amount of grassroots support. That's something Mitch McConnell hasn't gone against before."

Her campaign says it's raised even more money since McConnell became the face of the federal government's response to the coronavirus pandemic. In the month of April alone, McGrath raked in $5 million in donations. Her team said a lot of the cash came in after McConnell's inflammatory comment about letting states go bankrupt instead of offering them more financial relief.

"It's just pure McConnell," McGrath said of the senator's handling of the coronavirus pandemic. It wasn't a compliment.

Some of his failures, she argued, included holding up the first round of legislation to ensure pharmaceutical companies could gouge prices on coronavirus vaccines. She also criticized McConnell over tax changes included in the historic $2 trillion CARES Act that largely benefit millionaires, and for the lack of oversight on the $500 billion given to mid-sized and large businesses in federal aid. McGrath called the relief program a "slush fund" for big corporations.

"Then when state and local governments—who basically employ our firefighters, policemen, health care workers, teachers—say we need help, what does Mitch McConnell do? He said, 'Well you guys should just go bankrupt.' I mean seriously?" McGrath said. "We'd never be talking about Senator McGrath saying anything about state and local governments should be going bankrupt. I'd never even think about it."

But before she can directly challenge McConnell for his Senate seat, she has to get through the state's Democratic primary on June 23. Her two biggest rivals include Mike Broihier, a farmer and retired lieutenant colonel with the Marines, and Charles Booker, a state legislator from Louisville.

The two have pressed McGrath for not being progressive enough. Broihier described her platform as "empty." Booker said the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee's decision to back her is "complete disrespect to the people of Kentucky."

McGrath, despite claiming in her 2018 bid that she was "more progressive" than anyone in Kentucky, has largely stayed in the center where her competitors have jumped to the left. She backs Obamacare but doesn't support a single-payer health care system like Medicare for All. She supports income equality but doesn't go so far as Booker and Broihier, who back a monthly universal basic income.

McGrath fended off the criticism from her progressive opponents, matter-of-factly stating she's a "common sense Kentucky Democrat" who can get things done for residents.

Amy McGrath address supporters after her loss during her Election Night Event at the EKU Center for the Arts on November 6, 2018, in Richmond, Kentucky. McGrath is running to unseat Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

Staying in the middle of the road could be a winning strategy for McGrath if she makes it out of the Democratic primary. Her 2018 race was in a more purple district, whereas the state of Kentucky is reliably red: It went to Trump in 2016 by more than 30 points. And with the president at the top of the ballot this year, it'll be hard to imagine a candidate winning the Senate seat without gaining a good portion of his supporters.

But McGrath's moderate approach has hit the occasional snag, as her inconsistency on some issues has drawn criticism from both sides of the aisle. Last year she drew heat over her comments on Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. First, she said she would have supported his confirmation. Hours later she walked back the remark.

Any slip from McGrath is likely to be seized on by McConnell, whose re-election strategy almost always involves piling on attacks against his opponents. In 2014, he spent more than $30 million on ads against an opponent he beat by a wide margin. In his latest statewide advertising blitz, McConnell slammed McGrath for using the coronavirus crisis to spend "millions on false partisan attacks."

"McGrath fuels fear with lies even liberal newspapers call false. But while Amy McGrath lies, Mitch McConnell leads," one ad said.

McGrath has held her own in McConnell's ad war, refusing to stop airing clips even when the Senate Majority Leader called for a cease-fire amid the coronavirus pandemic. The two have spent millions on radio and television spots since the summer of 2019—an entire year before the November election.

"I've built a team to be able to take him on in the way he needs to be taken on to be defeated. We're working very hard to do that," McGrath said.

"We can get him out. We can actually do some very practical things that can help people's lives and make life better for Kentuckians and that's what I'm all about."