The 38-year-old Democratic state lawmaker says that her party needs a generational shift.
State Senator Mallory McMorrow of Michigan, a Democrat from the Detroit suburbs, jumped into her state’s U.S. Senate race on Wednesday, becoming the first prominent candidate to enter the contest, which will help decide control of the chamber next fall.
The seat opened after Senator Gary Peters, a Democrat, announced his retirement, and the race — in a state that has often favored Democratic senators but twice voted for President Trump — will be among the most closely watched in the country next year.
“We need new leaders,” Ms. McMorrow, 38, said in her announcement video. “The same people in D.C. who got us into this mess are not going to be the ones to get us out of it.”
Ms. McMorrow won Democrats’ acclaim several years ago for defending liberal values while identifying herself as a “straight, white, Christian, married suburban mom,” and her announcement video featured national pundits remarking on the speech. She flipped a Republican-held district in 2018 and is the first woman to become State Senate majority whip, her campaign has noted, in Michigan’s history.
She is unlikely to have the Democratic lane to herself for long.
Democrats who have signaled that they are eyeing the Senate race include Representative Haley Stevens, a moderate from suburban Detroit; Representative Kristen McDonald Rivet, a Democrat who won a challenging House district in Michigan last year; and Abdul El-Sayed, an outgoing health director in Wayne County and a progressive who ran unsuccessfully against now-Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, in the 2018 primary.
Ms. Whitmer, who is term-limited, has said she is uninterested in running for Senate. Pete Buttigieg, the former transportation secretary and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate, has also taken himself out of contention.
Whoever emerges from the Democratic primary, the race is expected to be competitive in the general election.
Republicans who could or are expected to run include former Representative Mike Rogers, who narrowly lost to Senator Elissa Slotkin, a Democrat, in November, and Representative Bill Huizenga. Tudor Dixon, who lost the governor’s race to Ms. Whitmer in 2022, and Kevin Rinke, who lost that Republican primary, could look at runs for Senate or governor.