In Missouri’s U. S. Senate primary campaign, former State Treasurer Sarah Steelman took endorsement today from a former advisor to the late President Ronald Reagan .
Steelman is calculating to add weight to her part of a three-way G.O.P. contest.
Robert Mcfarlane was national security advisor in the Reagan administration, worked with the Senate Armed Services Committee on the SALT II Treaty, pleaded guilty to holding back information from Congress in the Iran-Contra coverup and was later pardoned by President George H.W. Bush.
Mcfarlane said he liked Steelman at first meeting, describing in her a sharp sense of finance and willingness to cut back popular programs--“I admire the other candidates here in the primary but I believe that she’s actually done it and had courage to stand up against some pretty severe criticism.”
If successful in the primary, Steelman would face Democratic incumbent Senator Claire McCaskill in November.