Former U.S. congresswoman Kendra Horn, a Democrat, joins the Oklahoma Senate race to

Although Horn has not issued an official announcement for her Senate campaign, a new site created for it says she is “so excited to announce my run for Senate in Oklahoma.”

“Oklahoma doesn’t belong to a party, it belongs to the people,” Horn says on her website. “Oklahomans deserve to have their voices heard because there is so much at stake. Our health care is at stake. Our public schools are at stake. The future of our communities is at stake.”

The site also details her time in the House and describes her 2018 win against Russell as “the biggest upset victory of the midterm election cycle with a campaign that many considered a moonshot.” Horn beat Russell in a district that then favored Republicans by 11 percentage points and had been held by the GOP for 44 years. With that election, Horn became the first Democratic woman to represent Oklahoma in Congress.

According to the Oklahoman, Federal Election Commission records also show Horn changing her campaign committee name from “for Congress” to “for Senate.”

Horn is entering a crowded race to replace Inhofe, 87, who announced that he was resigning from the Senate in February after more than five decades in Congress.

Inhofe said he would not finish his term and will leave the Senate on Jan. 3, 2023. He is currently two years into a six-year term, and his resignation set up a sudden political scramble in the Sooner State, with a Republican primary race that has already attracted some of the state party’s most prominent members.

Even before Inhofe confirmed the news of his resignation, his top Senate aide, chief of staff Luke Holland, unveiled a campaign website. Inhofe has endorsed Holland, 35, as his replacement.

“There has to be one day where you say, ‘All right, this is going to be it,’ ” Inhofe told the Oklahoman. It is “now time for that next generation of Oklahomans to have the opportunity to serve the state in the U.S. Senate,” he added.

Other Republicans in the special election race include Rep. Markwayne Mullin and former Oklahoma House speaker T.W. Shannon. The Republican primary is June 28.

After her defeat in the House race in 2020, Horn joined other former House Democrats — including Gil Cisneros and Xochitl Torres Small — in sub-Cabinet-level posts in the Biden administration. Horn held a job at the National Space Council. During her time in the House, she chaired the Science Committee’s space subcommittee.