Sinema’s not-yet-launched 2024 campaign taking donations as if she’s running
Emily Jacobs
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Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ) has yet to launch her 2024 reelection campaign, but the Democrat-turned-independent is certainly fundraising as though she’s running.
Despite her enormous influence as one of the most coveted swing votes in a closely split Senate, Sinema’s low approval rating in Arizona and public breakup with the Democratic Party have made her the most vulnerable incumbent up for reelection in the 2024 election cycle. Should she decide to seek a second term, Sinema’s race will put her theory that most voters have also spurned their party identity to the test. It is not clear yet, though, if she can build enough of a centrist coalition to win statewide.
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Sinema has declined to say if she is running yet, though that hasn’t stopped her from fundraising. Sinema raised $2.1 million in the first quarter of this year and reported having $10 million cash on hand as of March 31, Federal Election Commission filings show. Of the Q1 earnings, more than half of those contributions came from donors who gave $3,300, the individual donation maximum. More than 30% came from employees and senior leadership at top investment firms, including Blackstone, the Carlyle Group, and Elliott Advisors.
She also received several donations from prominent Republicans, such as Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s (R-AK) Denali Leadership PAC; Blackstone’s Stephen Schwarzman, a major GOP donor; Kohlberg Kravis Roberts’s Ken Mehlman, who chaired the Republican National Committee from 2005-2007; and Anthony Scaramucci, the financier who briefly served as former President Donald Trump’s White House communications director and had connected with Sinema about cryptocurrency.
Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ), who emerged as a prominent Sinema critic as she began bucking her party under President Joe Biden and launched a bid to unseat her in January, reported raising $3.7 million last quarter. Gallego’s campaign touted that 98% of the Q1 haul came from donors who gave under $100 in an effort to contrast their candidate with Sinema.
“At the end of the day: This seat is not going to be bought by a few rich guys on Wall Street,” Gallego said in a dig at his Senate colleague. “It’s going to be won with the support of regular, everyday Arizonans — and I’m proud to have them in my corner.”
While Gallego’s $2.7 million cash on hand pales in comparison to Sinema’s $10 million war chest, both are setting themselves up as formidable candidates embarking on what could be a murder-suicide pact that hands Republicans control of the Senate.
Instead of remaining with the party as Gallego continued to outperform her in primary polls, Sinema announced in December that she had registered as an independent. While the move protected her from a primary fight, it also set her up for challenges from both sides of the aisle. In addition to Gallego on her left, Sinema’s embattled position has Republicans jumping at the chance to run to her right.
Kari Lake, the controversial 2022 gubernatorial candidate who still refuses to concede her loss to Gov. Katie Hobbs (D-AZ), is actively thinking about a bid. Blake Masters, the venture capitalist who unsuccessfully challenged incumbent Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) in 2022, and Karrin Taylor Robson, a businesswoman with strong establishment bona fides who lost to Lake in the 2022 GOP gubernatorial primary, are also considering runs. Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb is the only declared GOP candidate thus far.
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Sinema was two years into her first term when Biden ascended to the presidency and Democrats just barely clinched control of the Senate with the help of Vice President Kamala Harris’s tiebreaking vote. Despite Harris’s vote, which she has in the VP’s capacity as president of the Senate, Democrats still lacked a filibuster-proof majority that would allow them to pass most legislation through the body.
She and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) became foes within the party for their refusal to support eliminating the 60-vote filibuster threshold as the rest of the Senate Democratic Conference got on board, facing an intense, very public pressure campaign to shift their stance on the issue as Biden’s agenda stalled. Sinema in particular was turned into a boogeyman among Democrats for her refusal to defend her position publicly as frequently as Manchin, who maintains a rigorous press schedule.