Gabby_ A Story of Courage and Hope - Alison Hanson [7]
That was especially true when we were actually together. On this drive to Washington, our conversation turned to the next career steps for each of us. Gabby was weighing the idea of running for the U.S. Senate in 2012, if the incumbent, Jon Kyl, a Republican, chose to retire. She was also considering passing on that race, and instead, waiting until 2014 to run for governor of Arizona.
Gabby was troubled by some of the policies of Governor Jan Brewer, especially her signing of Arizona SB 1070, the act that required local law enforcement officers to determine the immigration status of people they suspected could be in the country illegally. The bill encouraged racial profiling and shifted attention away from the real problem: the federal government’s failure in its duty to secure our borders and fix our broken immigration system. Gabby’s 9,000-square-mile congressional district borders Mexico for 114 miles, and she has devoted much of her public life to finding ways to better secure the border. Still, she felt that SB 1070, which stirred anger and protests nationwide, had damaged her state’s reputation, hurting business and tourism.
A part of Gabby felt a calling to run for governor, to do what she could to improve policies—especially in education and budget management—that she considered destructive. She had other worries, too, about her state’s housing crisis, its vulnerability to the economic downturn, and the deep problems in the health care system, including the inadequacies of mental-health policies.
Gabby was a raging optimist, but she was also a pragmatist, and as we drove north, I saw both sides of her. She knew it would be hard for her, a Democrat from Tucson, to win statewide office. Arizona is a red state, with passionate conservatives wielding a lot of influence, and those Democrats who are able to succeed usually come from Phoenix, where their voters and campaign contributors are more plentiful. (The last time a Tucsonan had won a statewide election was in 1976, when Dennis DeConcini was elected to fill a vacant seat in the U.S. Senate.)
“I don’t know that I could win the governor’s race or a Senate seat,” Gabby told me. “But someone has to do something for the sake of Arizona. Maybe I’m the someone. Maybe I have a duty to run.”
Later on the drive, talk turned to my future. Gabby was always the biggest dreamer. Nothing was going to hold her back, and she didn’t want anything holding me back, either. The Navy had loaned me to NASA for the astronaut program, and Gabby thought that when I left NASA, I ought to aim high. Maybe I could be an admiral.
“Gabby, I’ve been at NASA, and essentially out of the Navy, for fifteen years,” I reminded her. “I don’t know if the Navy would want me as an admiral.” Gabby was undeterred. She didn’t just think I should come to Washington to seek a spot on the Joint Chiefs of Staff. She thought I ought to be chairman of the Joint Chiefs. “That’s not a very realistic idea,” I told her, shaking my head at her audacity.
“Well, you’d be great,” Gabby told me. “And you’d enjoy yourself, too.”
Being married to Gabby was like hanging out with a full-time motivator. It was hard to be lazy or unenthusiastic when she was making plans for your life.
On Monday night, after we pulled into Washington, we had dinner with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and her husband, Jonathan. Gabby had gotten very close with Kirsten and a few other women on the Hill, including Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida. There aren’t a lot of young women in Congress, and when they find and like each other, the bond is pretty powerful. Not all women share a passion for talking about government regulations or the