Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, you may have heard, left the Democratic Party, and is now an independent, and this is supposedly going to upset the apple cart for Democrats in the Senate.
It’s not. Here’s why.
Reason #1: she’s still going to caucus with Democrats
This is a bit inside baseball here, but the way our two-party system enforces itself, the House and Senate basically have two sides, the majority side and the minority side.
Individual members line up with one or the other for run-of-the-mill things like committee assignments.
In the case of Sinema, then, she has to caucus with one side or the other.
She’s been making it clear in interviews today that she’s going to continue caucusing with Democrats.
“I don’t anticipate that anything will change about the Senate structure,” Sinema told Politico.
Reason #2: this is all about her 2024 re-election campaign
Sinema, who started her political career as a progressive member of the Green Party, went mainstream with a move to the Democratic Party to run for a seat in Congress in 2012, which she won, then became a moderate Democrat because she realized she wouldn’t win elections in Arizona as a progressive.
That’s how she won the Arizona Senate seat in 2018, and as much as her Blue Doggedness rankles progressives, it’s smart politics on her part.
Looking ahead to 2024, then, Arizona Congressman Ruben Gallego, a progressive Democrat, has made noise about challenging her for the party’s Senate nomination.
Sinema switching to independent is a pre-emptive strike at Gallego or any other potential progressive challenger, and at the Democratic Party establishment.
Party primaries, even in purple states like Arizona, tend to be difficult for moderate candidates, Democrat or Republican.
With Sinema now an independent, Democrats would run the risk of splitting the vote in the 2024 general and handing the seat back to Republicans in the process.
Sinema seems to be gambling here that “leaving” the party will better equip her to be able to hold off a challenge from the left and allow her to go one-on-one with a Republican in November 2024.
Again, smart politics.
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Chris Graham
