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SENATOR KIRSTEN SINEMA OF ARIZONA Kyrsten Sinema, whut??? ... Kyrsten Sinema is leaving the Democratic Party. Original article: Peter Burgess COMMENTARY Peter Burgess | ||
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Kyrsten Sinema, whut??? ... Kyrsten Sinema is leaving the Democratic Party.
Written by Michael Tomasky December 9th 2022 12:15 PM Item one: Sinema’s theatrics ... There’s a lot to plow through here, but first of all, we can be sure this means she’d love to run for president someday, because she told Politico: “I am not running for president.” This won’t change the balance of power in the Senate. But in typical Sinema opera-diva fashion, it’s complicated. She won’t exactly caucus with the Democrats, as independents Bernie Sanders and Angus King do. She won’t attend the Democrats’ weekly caucus meetings, but she rarely attends those now. She’s not sure where her desk will be on the Senate floor (from the vantage point of the Senate president’s chair looking out, the Democrats are grouped to the right, perhaps paradoxically, and the Republicans to the left, and seniority tends to move one toward the front and the center). In case you’re wondering what this means for Chuck Schumer: He was reelected by the caucus as majority leader yesterday. CNN says it was unanimous, which would obviously mean that Sinema voted for him. Sinema’s timing clearly had something to do with that vote, sending a signal to Schumer that this isn’t going to be as easy a ride as he’d hoped. The two aren’t exactly close, from what I hear. But Schumer does have some leverage over Sinema in the form of committee assignments. When politicians do things like this, they of course give reasons. “Americans are told that we have only two choices—Democrat or Republican—and that we must subscribe wholesale to policy views the parties hold, views that have been pulled further and further toward the extremes,” Sinema wrote in an op-ed for The Arizona Republic, later adding, “Like a lot of Arizonans, I have never fit perfectly in either national party.” She told Politico that “registering as an independent is what I believe is right for my state.” What I think that actually means is, “I have some key donors who will be very pleased by this move.” Her politics have always seemed pretty transparent to me. She’s a liberal in most ways. She used to be a leftist, a member of the Green Party; the Greens I’ve known typically believe there’s not a dime’s worth of difference between the two parties. She’s voted for liberal judges and liberal positions on social issues, and she’ll continue to do so. But when it comes to taking money out of the pockets of rich people and corporations and redistributing it to working people, she suddenly draws red lines. That screams “donors” to me. She’s up for reelection in 2024. Democratic Congressman Ruben Gallego has been pretty clear, including to me, that he’s leaning toward running against her. Becoming an independent means she’ll face no primary challenge, which she was likely to lose (Gallego is a formidable politician with deep credibility among Democrats). But can she win as an independent? We have to assume she gave long and hard study to this question and believes she can. But how does the vote divide in a three-way race involving, say, Sinema, Gallego, and Republican Kari Lake? That sounds to me like it probably ends with Senator Lake taking the oath in January 2025. Sinema has to know this. Or maybe she intends not to run. She has certainly set herself up for a handsome K Street career. As far as K Street’s hiring managers are concerned, you can vote for all the liberal judges you want, but as long as you keep that minimum wage low and make Schumer dump elimination of the carried-interest loophole from the Inflation Reduction Act, you’re in.
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