Amy McGrath

Amy Melinda McGrath (born June 3, 1975) is an American former Marine fighter pilot and political candidate from Kentucky. McGrath was the first woman to fly a combat mission for the Marine Corps and the first woman to pilot the F/A-18 in a combat mission. She was inspired to be a fighter pilot after studying World War II aviation in middle school and taking family trips to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.

Toward the end of her service, McGrath worked domestically as a political adviser, liaison officer, and instructor at the United States Naval Academy. Following retirement from military service in 2017, McGrath entered politics. She was the Democratic nominee for Kentucky's 6th congressional district in the 2018 election, losing to incumbent Republican Andy Barr by a margin of 51% to 47.8%. In July 2019, McGrath announced her campaign in the 2020 election for the United States Senate, challenging incumbent Mitch McConnell. In a close primary, McGrath defeated state representative Charles Booker to gain the nomination of the Democratic Party. McGrath outraised McConnell by more than $32 million, but lost the general election by nearly 20 points. In October 2025, McGrath declared her intent to run as a Democrat in Kentucky's 2026 Senate election. She lost to Booker in the primary.

Early life and education McGrath was born in Cincinnati, Ohio. She grew up in Edgewood, Kentucky, just outside of Covington, the youngest of three children. Her father, Donald McGrath, was a high school teacher who taught in Cincinnati for 40 years. Her mother, Marianne McGrath, is a psychiatrist who was one of the first women to graduate from the University of Kentucky's medical school. As a student, McGrath was the student director of the Naval Academy Foreign Affairs Conference and a member of the academy's women's varsity soccer team.

McGrath received a graduate certificate in legislative studies from Georgetown University in 2011.

Military career

Training and pre-deployment (1997–2002) After graduating from the Naval Academy, at the age of 21, McGrath was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Marine Corps. In 1999, McGrath completed flight school and started her career as a Weapons Systems Officer (WSO), When McGrath and fellow Marine pilot Jaden Kim joined VMFA-121, they became the first female aviators to join the squadron. In January 2003, stationed in Kuwait, McGrath flew in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom in Iraq, where she provided air support to ground troops and conducted reconnaissance and air strikes.

After being promoted to captain, McGrath completed flight school in 2004, becoming a pilot. McGrath's campaign announcement video attracted national attention.

McGrath said that she saw former representative Ben Chandler, Barr's Democratic predecessor, speak at the Naval Academy and she had reached out to him for help when she began considering running for election.

To focus on rural voters, McGrath set up multiple field offices in less populated areas of Kentucky. McGrath was endorsed by Representative Seth Moulton, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, and a veterans' political action committee (PAC)s VoteVets.org and With Honor.

McGrath won the Democratic Party primary on May 22, 2018. She defeated Jim Gray, the mayor of Lexington, She won all 18 rural counties in the district with the exception of Fayette County. After the win, Gray endorsed McGrath, as did the DCCC via their Red to Blue campaign. Former Vice President Joe Biden called to congratulate McGrath.

McGrath was defeated in the November 2018 general election by Barr, who won 51% of the vote to McGrath's 47.8%.

2020 U.S. Senate campaign

On July 9, 2019, McGrath announced on Twitter that she was running for the United States Senate for Kentucky in the 2020 election, challenging incumbent senator Mitch McConnell, a Republican and the Majority Leader. McGrath raised $3.5 million in her first week. In her launch video, McGrath stated that "bit by bit, year by year, turned Washington into something we all despise – where dysfunction and chaos are political weapons."

McGrath endorsed Joe Biden's 2020 presidential campaign ahead of the Democratic Party's Iowa caucuses.

McGrath's campaign reported raising $12.8 million in the first quarter of 2020, outraising McConnell, who reported raising $7.4 million in the same period. As of September 2020, donors had contributed $43 million to the Amy for America PAC and $39.6 million to the Amy McGrath for Senate PAC through ActBlue.

McGrath won the Democratic nomination with 45% of the primary vote. McGrath's vote share skewed towards rural areas: she won all but five counties, with those counties being among the most populous in the commonwealth. Other candidates in the primary included Kentucky representative Charles Booker, who received 43%, and retired Marine Mike Broihier, who won 5%. Broihier and Booker both ultimately endorsed McGrath.

In September, McGrath was endorsed by Kentucky's sitting governor, Andy Beshear. She was also endorsed by the Kentucky Education Association, a teachers union affiliated with the National Education Association and the largest professional group in Kentucky. On October 12, she was endorsed in the general election by the Lexington Herald-Leader.

In September, McGrath released a five-point plan for Kentucky involving the federal response to COVID-19, health care, infrastructure, racial equality, and corruption. On October 12, McGrath and McConnell held a debate. McGrath criticized McConnell's response to the COVID-19 pandemic, arguing that he should have been able to pass an additional relief bill over Democratic objections, as was done with the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017.

McGrath outraised McConnell by more than $32 million. On May 19, 2026, she lost the Democratic nomination to Charles Booker.

Political positions In her 2018 House and 2020 Senate races, McGrath identified herself as a moderate Democrat. McGrath considers herself a fiscal conservative. as have her progressive primary opponents, Charles Booker and Mike Broihier. McGrath has stated "I want to do what's best for Kentucky, and when President Trump has good ideas, I'm going to be for them. To me it's not about your political party, it's not about wearing a red jersey or blue jersey." McGrath opposes Medicare for All, saying that she prefers to improve on the ACA and that she opposes the abolition of private health insurance. During her 2018 House campaign, she had indicated she liked the idea of single-payer healthcare plans, but thought they just were not feasible.

Economy McGrath opposed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017. She favored making permanent the temporary tax cuts for the middle class contained in the bill.

McGrath supports investing in infrastructure in eastern Kentucky to offset the economic impacts of the coal industry’s continuing decline. She favors stronger background checks on firearm sales, as well as "banning sales to those on terror watch lists, and continuing federal research on the gun violence epidemic." She supports national standards including banning chokeholds, banning no-knock search warrants in federal drug cases and supporting independent investigations when warranted.

Immigration McGrath has called for comprehensive immigration reform. McGrath opposes building a physical barrier or wall along the entire US border with Mexico, saying it would be "very expensive" and not be effective, and "it would take decades to build and then you can just defeat it with a ladder. We can secure our border with better technology" such as drone patrols. She opposes abolishing Immigrations and Customs Enforcement.

Other domestic issues McGrath opposes late-term abortions. In 2019 she favored the status quo concerning abortion restrictions, saying "there are [currently] enough restrictions on abortion and they're reasonable."

McGrath opposes free college tuition paid for by the government.

McGrath supports term limits. Specifically, a representative of her 2020 campaign said McGrath "strongly" supports a limit of two terms in the Senate. In the primary, many of the Senators who backed McGrath have spent more than two terms in the Senate. Some of the Senators who backed Charles Booker have not.

Foreign policy In 2016, McGrath authored an editorial for Foreign Policy magazine, calling for a thorough investigation of the decision-making process that the U.S. government took leading up to the Iraq War, similar to the British Chilcot Report. She cited the "seven investigations... 33 hearings, and ... almost $7 million examining every facet of the disaster in Benghazi, Libya, in which four Americans were killed," and contrasted it with the "4,806 American and coalition members deaths and 32,246 wounded" and estimated $3 trillion spent during the Iraq War, without any investigation.

McGrath has stated that "the major concern for the security of our nation remains the threat of a nuclear device in the hands of a violent non-state actor — so we must be relentless when it comes to seeking nuclear nonproliferation around the world." Neither Mitch McConnell nor Wendell Ford replied, and her congressman provided a condescending reply, so McGrath wrote every member of the House Armed Services Committee asking for a change in the law. The family lives in Georgetown, Kentucky.

In April 2017, McGrath's father died of cancer at the age of 76.

Works and publications