ARIZONA: Openly Gay State Rep Declares Candidacy For Giffords' U.S. House Seat

"Moving forward I believe the best thing that we can do is to honor her strength, and conviction, and her leadership, by getting somebody, quickly, because we don’t have much time, into that seat who is going to carry forward in the tradition of moderate, bipartisan, common sense governance that she did so well for Southern Arizona." - Openly gay Arizona state Rep. Matt Heinz, declaring his intent to run in the special election to replace Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.

If elected, Heinz would become the fifth openly gay member of the U.S. House. That number will change this fall with the retirement of Barney Frank and with Tammy Baldwin's run for the Senate. Heinz says if Giffords' district director wants to assume the remaining months of the current term, he'll suspend his own campaign until November.