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Uhen Kirsten Sinema campaigned for the Senate as an “independent voice for Arizona,” her volunteers did not take that literally. Maybe they heard what they wanted to hear. Anna Doan, a retired teacher, thought Sinema would bring fresh energy to Washington as Arizona’s first openly LGBTQ senator. Devina Alvarado, a young Costco forklift driver, thought Sinema would protect women’s rights from Donald Trump. Michael (identified by his middle name to avoid retaliation) admires that Sinema has risen from poverty after experiencing homelessness as a child, as he did. Each from a different corner of Arizona, they were all proud to have volunteered for Sinema to be chosen, proud of the doors they knocked on and the calls they made, proud to have her shiny purple and yellow literature scattered throughout their at home or on the floor of their car. But their pride had died down long before Sinema announced he was leaving the Democratic Party last Friday.
So far, Sinema’s White House and Senate colleagues have been conciliatory, praising her legislative skills and acting as if little will change after her replacement. (Sinema will still caucus with Democrats.) Although her influence will wane in the upcoming 51-49 House, Democrats can’t afford to make Sinema a pariah. When reached for comment on the switch, a Sinema spokesperson told me in an email, “Kirsten’s approach has remained the same since she ran for the Senate,” and directed me to a slick video released by Sinema on Friday: “I will be the same person I’ve always been,” the senator said.
But many of her staunchest supporters don’t see it that way. I spoke with dozens of former Sinema volunteers from across Arizona, some of whom I managed in 2018 as a field organizer for the Arizona Democratic Party. What they described to me is a feeling that is more raw and painful than a simple disagreement about policies. Arizona Democrats are used to this; many have Republicans and Independents in their family. They are used to talking through differences. What they cannot forgive is the feeling that Sinema was not straight with them.
Doan, the teacher, has worked on many campaigns in the border city of Nogales. She had just retired when Sinema announced her candidacy and she threw herself into the Senate race. Sinema was smart, well-spoken, a member of the LGBTQ community, and a fundraising force. In previous elections, Doan had asked the state party to do more phone banking in Spanish, and she didn’t like that phone bankers were pandering to older Hispanic voters who had questions about important issues. Things were different in Sinema’s campaign. Doan could have phone bank lists brought to other volunteers’ houses so they could call from the comfort of their own homes.
She was thrilled when Sinema won, but her excitement was short-lived. Sinema, she said, began spending too much time with the Big Business people who had bankrolled her campaign and not enough time with the working-class people who had made phone calls for her. Doane told me it hurts to watch her senator block positive initiatives that other Democrats want to pass. “She made a fool of me and I made a fool of all the people I talked to,” Doan said. She said she wishes Sinema had run as an independent in 2018 so people would know who she really is.
Alvarado, the forklift driver, had never volunteered for a political campaign before. She canvassed for Sinema several days a week after work and also on weekends, always wearing her pink Planned Parenthood shirt. Alvarado couldn’t believe it when Sinema said she thought the defense of the filibuster was essential to protecting women’s rights. When Sinema comes up in conversation these days, Alvarado’s fiance teases her. “He knows I’m super salty that I volunteered for her,” she told me. “I’m certainly looking forward to campaigning for her opponent.”
Michael considered Sinema a personal hero when he began volunteering for her campaign in Phoenix. A few years before that he was homeless and so was she. But Michael felt betrayed in March 2021 when Sinema voted against raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour. “Hunger changes people,” he wrote to me in an email. “It made me wish no one felt that way. I guess that made her want to protect what she had.
Some of the people with the least illusions about Sinema were the people furthest from her. Misa Foy, the chairman of the Navajo County Democrats, didn’t even vote for Sinema in the primary. In 2018, she knocked on more than 1,000 doors for a ballot initiative in Navajo County, one of Arizona’s most rural regions. (You can’t walk down the sidewalk to the next house on your list in Navajo—you get back in your truck and drive there.) Voters Foy spoke to would offer her dinner and shelter from the cold, and hear why they should oppose programs such as expanding school vouchers. Although Foy threw out the Democratic slate of candidates, with Sinema at the helm, she did not persuade her. Foy told me she’s grateful for all the things Democrats, including Sinema, have been able to push through the Senate, but she doesn’t think Sinema’s new party preferences are anything to shake up. “Our mission is the same as before this news came out,” she said.
When Sinema visited Hopi Sovereign Land in 2018, Karen Shupla was impressed by her knowledge of water rights and other issues important to Native Americans. A tribal election registrar, Shupla is strictly neutral, but she volunteers hundreds of hours to make sure elections run smoothly in a region that Democrats hold by a two-to-one margin. She was not surprised when the Hopi and other tribes supported Sinema by a large margin and was indifferent to Sinema becoming independent. “It depends on how he deals with the natives from here on out,” Shupla told me. “We don’t want to guess which side she’s going to take on the issues.”
The volunteer I spoke to over the weekend who still has the greatest affection for Sinema was the one who knew her personally. Martha “Marty” Bruno met Sinema when the two ran for different seats in the Arizona state legislature in 2000. “I never ran again and she never lost again,” Bruno told me. The two kept in touch. Bruno believes her fellow progressive Democrats were angry and felt they were putting too much pressure on Sinema, who voted with Biden more than 90 percent of the time. She told me she doesn’t get Sinema’s reputation for being unapproachable. When I asked her if she would support Sinema over a Democratic challenger, Bruno praised Sinema’s record and said she would have to consider both candidates. In dozens of interviews, it was the closest any of Sinema’s former volunteers would come to saying they would vote for her again.
Some believe that Sinema is going independent because it cannot win against a major contender. Campaigning as an independent worked in Alaska for Lisa Murkowski in 2010 and in 2006 for Joe Lieberman in Connecticut, but they ran in deep red and deep blue states where their party was dominant enough to form a coalition with voters from other parties. Arizona is purple, with roughly equal parts Republicans, Independents, and Democrats. Sinema has positioned herself as a lone politician capable of uniting her country, but if she is re-elected, it will likely be by forcing expensive and vicious elections.
As David A. Graham writes Atlantica last week, Sinema’s move was forced, but it came from a place of weakness. She looks vulnerable to a challenge not only from the left but also from the centre. Arizona just elected a full slate of establishment Democrats in a year far less favorable than 2018, when Sinema won his seat. It’s unclear whether the Senate Democratic campaign will even support her next time around. Moreover, 2024 is a presidential election year in an era when split-ticket voting is rare. Although Sinema is the incumbent, her strained relationship with the Arizona Democratic Party means she will not benefit from the party’s fundraising or mobilization infrastructure. They don’t know what to expect from her, and she doesn’t feel obligated to publicly explain what she believes or why she believes it. That is her right. But it is also the prerogative of the people who borrowed Sinema’s time and reputation to now turn against her. In a bitter irony, the volunteers who labored to elect her may be among those working hardest to defeat her.
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