Former US Army private, security expert and infamous Chelsea Manning caught everyone by surprise after she filed the necessary paperwork in order to run for the 2018 Maryland Democratic primary late last week.
Outlets covered Manning's unconfirmed Senate bid throughout the weekend, but Manning confirmed the reports overnight via her Twitter account.
Manning tweeted, "yup, we're running for senate 😎🌈💕," with her trademark hashtag, '#WeGotThis':
The tweet also included Manning's first campaign video, which features her narrating over glitching video footage of recent protests throughout the US.
In the video, Manning says, "We live in trying times; times of fear, of suppression, of hate. We don't need more or better leaders, we need someone willing to fight.
"We need to stop asking them to give us our rights. They won't support us. They won't compromise.
"We need to stop expecting that our systems will somehow fix themselves. We need to actually take the reigns of power from them. We need to challenge them at every level. We need to fix this.
"We don't need them anymore. We can do better. You're damn right we got this."
Manning's Senate bid will see her run against senior Senator Ben Cardin, who has held the seat since 2007.
You can watch Manning's campaign video below:
