Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ) won’t say if she’ll run for re-election this year, which would be her first election since leaving the Democratic party to become an independent.
In the meantime, Rep. Ruben Gallego (D) and Kari Lake (R) are raising money and hiring campaign teams to take her seat. They’re even running attack ads against Sinema.
Sinema needs to gather 42,000 signatures to get on the ballot by April 8, a process the Washington Post reports would cost about $1 million but hasn’t started yet.
The polling averages suggest Sinema has a very steep path to victory as an independent.
But today’s news that Sinema raised just $595,000 last quarter suggests she’s either already decided not to run — or that she just doesn’t have that many supporters left.