Krysten Sinema Leaves Democratic Party

[lpetrich]

Sinema Says She's 'Fairly Libertarian,' Wants to Work in Private Sector - Business Insider

She also joked about being "overqualified" for President and she said that gridlock in DC will only get worse.

Overqualified???

She recently appeared at "The All In Summit", and she said "I'm really excited about what's happening in the private sector right now. I mean, we've got industries in this country that are really pushing the edge on what's going to ensure that we're globally competitive and innovative for the future, and I'm really excited about it." Seems like she knows where her comes from. She said that that is so "regardless of what's happening in government" and that lawmakers are "not interested in solving problems, they're just interested in TikTok." "There's a real opportunity to move our country forward, despite the gridlock in government, through private industry, and that's where I want to work."

Someone asked KS why Democrats are "anti-capitalist". She responded "I don't understand because that's where the money comes from. I'm fairly libertarian, you know, just at my base. Most Arizonans are. I struggle with the idea of wanting to eliminate the private industry, because that is where the ideas come from. That's where the innovation comes from, and that's where the money comes from to fund the social programs that are important to protect the vulnerable in our country."

Right-libertarian Marxism. Instead of the working class being exploited and oppressed it's the business elite.

According to a biography of Sen. Mitt Romney, the Arizona senator once mused that she could "go on any board I want to" or "be a college president" after she leaves the Senate, arguing that she "saved the Senate" by opposing the weakening of the filibuster.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

I could manage her being a conservative Democrat. What I didn't like about her was she was terribly quiet while doing so. You never knew what she was going to support. At least Manchin, you had a better idea. With Sinema, she was all style in dress, but not much leadership. If you are going to hold bills up, speak up about what you are looking for!

 

[laughing dog]

Sinema Says She's 'Fairly Libertarian,' Wants to Work in Private Sector - Business Insider

She also joked about being "overqualified" for President and she said that gridlock in DC will only get worse.

Overqualified???

Compared to Trump she is.

 

[lpetrich]

Manchin, Sinema pan Harris over call to scrap filibuster - 09/24/24 2:58 PM ET

Sens. Joe Manchin (I-W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) sharply criticized Vice President Harris after she said on Tuesday that she wants to scrap the legislative filibuster in order to codify Roe v. Wade.

The two rotating villains of Build Back Better.

Manchin, one of the foremost backers of the 60-vote threshold, told CNN that he will not support Harris’s bid for the White House. He said it would be a massive mistake to move ahead with those plans if Democrats keep hold of the upper chamber.

“Shame on her,” Manchin, who is retiring at year’s end, told CNN. “She knows the filibuster is the Holy Grail of democracy. It’s the only thing that keeps us talking and working together. If she gets rid of that, then this would be the House on steroids.”

In a statement, the West Virginia senator, who left the Democratic Party to become an Independent in May, added that the filibuster “stabilizes our democracy, promotes bipartisan cooperation and protects our nation from partisan whiplash and dysfunction.”

“I have always said: ‘if you can’t change your mind, you can’t change anything’ and I am hopeful that the Vice President remains open to doing just that,” he said.

Kyrsten Sinema on X: "To state the supremely obvious, ..." / X

To state the supremely obvious, eliminating the filibuster to codify Roe v Wade also enables a future Congress to ban all abortion nationwide.

What an absolutely terrible, shortsighted idea.

As if the Republicans would let themselves be bound by it if it gets in their way.

 

[lpetrich]

I could manage her being a conservative Democrat. What I didn't like about her was she was terribly quiet while doing so. You never knew what she was going to support. At least Manchin, you had a better idea. With Sinema, she was all style in dress, but not much leadership. If you are going to hold bills up, speak up about what you are looking for!

Yes, Joe Manchin was very talkative back in 2021.

KS, however, said very little. Here also, she was the opposite of what she was like in her earlier years, before she was elected to her former House seat. She was very talkative back then, much like recent Joe Manchin.

 

[lpetrich]

Catching up.

After the Republicans got the Presidency and Congress last year, Kyrsten Sinema xweeted

Please, please, please stop what you’re doing and read these quotes,

Filing under: schadenfreude

Filibuster flip-flop: Dems ready to embrace tool to stonewall GOP -

The outlet quotes a number of prominent Democrats, including Sens.Dick Durbin (D-Ill), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) signaling support for the filibuster as a means to block President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming agenda.

Sen. Blumenthal: “I’d be lying if I said we’d be in a better position without the filibuster, We have a responsibility to stop autocratic and long-headed abuse of power or policy, and we’ll use whatever tools we have available. We’re not going to fight this battle with one hand tied behind our back.”

Sen. Durbin: “We had to live with it when we were in the majority." and it is "part of the calculation” of how Democrats will work as a minority.

Sen. Murphy: “You play with the rules that exist,” saying that he is willing to modify it but not “obliterate” it.

If this makes the Republicans willing to weaken or revoke it, then why not? They threatened to do so around 2005, when the Democrats filibustered some of GB II's appointees. The R's threatened the "nuclear option", and the D's backed down from their filibustering.

 2005 debate on nuclear option (United States Senate) and  Nuclear option

 

[lpetrich]

Over 2021 to 2022, Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema served as rotating villains, and at the end of last year, they did one last bit of villainy before going out of rotation.

Manchin, Sinema prevent Democrats from locking in majority on labor board through 2026 | AP News

Senate Democrats failed Wednesday to confirm a Democratic member of the National Labor Relations Board after independent Sens. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema opposed the nomination, thwarting their hopes of locking in a majority at the federal agency for the first two years of President-elect Donald Trump’s term.

A vote to move ahead with the nomination of Lauren McFarren, who currently chairs the NLRB, failed 49-50. Had she been confirmed to another five-year term, it would have cemented a Democratic majority on the agency’s board for the first two years of the incoming Trump administration. Now, Trump will likely be able to nominate McFarren’s replacement.

Labor unions liked LmF, while Republicans and business lobbies didn't.

 

[lpetrich]

Rotating villains? It Pays to Be a Conservative Democrat Blocking Popular Legislation - 11.05.2021

Why do conservative Democrats like Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin oppose wildly popular progressive policy measures? Because it’s a very lucrative racket.

What they did about Build Back Better:

During the fight over Democrats’ social spending reconciliation bill, Sinema, for example, has played a prominent — albeit silent — role in watering down the party’s plan to allow Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices. She’s also helped gut Democrats’ plan to expand Medicare benefits, nixed tax hikes on the wealthy and corporations, and pushed to make the overall bill smaller. While Sinema isn’t up for reelection until 2024, she is polling terribly and already facing the threat of a well-financed primary challenge.

While Manchin has a personal financial interest in protecting the fossil fuel industry, he’s also worked diligently to deny new Medicare dental benefits that seniors in his state desperately need. Manchin has been on a fundraising tear this year, despite stating last week that he hasn’t decided whether he’ll run for reelection in 2024.

Then about politicians becoming corporate lobbyists after leaving office. They are supposed to wait 2 years before becoming registered lobbyists, but they often get around that by becoming consultants.

Many of the Democratic lawmakers who played the agenda spoilers when Barack Obama was president have become professional influence peddlers. That’s true for every former Democratic senator who publicly opposed efforts to include a government health insurance plan, or a “public option,” in the party’s 2010 health care law, the Affordable Care Act (ACA).

Joe Lieberman of CT, retired in 2012. Blanche Lincoln of AR, defeated in 2010. Mary Landrieu of LA, defeated in 2014. Mark Pryor of AR, defeated in 2014. Max Baucus of MT, retired in 2014. Ben Nelson of NE, retired in 2012. Kent Conrad of ND, retired in 2012.

Many of them went on to become corporate lobbyists, sometimes running their own lobbying firms. Joe Lieberman went on to found No Labels, a self-styled nonpartisan group that is funded by behind-the-scenes billionaires.

The group has showered praise on Sinema for stalling the legislation, while Lieberman recently led a media campaign for his new book on the virtues of “centrism,” where he routinely touted Manchin and called on Democratic leaders to “accommodate him.”

 

[Jarhyn]

Maybe she should change her name to Roxanne. I wonder what the going rate is to buy someone's values? She does dirtier acts for the Republican party than anything in Requiem For a Dream.

 

[Derec]

Maybe she should change her name to Roxanne. I wonder what the going rate is to buy someone's values? She does dirtier acts for the Republican party than anything in Requiem For a Dream.

What's the reference? I do not recall anybody named Roxanne in that movie.

 

[Derec]

Rotating villains? It Pays to Be a Conservative Democrat Blocking Popular Legislation - 11.05.2021

Note that Jacobin is a commie rag.
But this is from 2021. Why post it now?

What they did about Build Back Better:

B³ was an incredibly irresponsible piece of legislation.
After the US spent a lot on COVID and on an infrastructure bill, the Biden administration - pushed by the Bernie/AOC wing of the party -wanted to spend an additional $3,500,000,000,000.00 on non-infrastructure spending.
In the time when the GOP is also irresponsible what with haphazard tariffs and a tax cut plan they have no hope of paying for, we should not pretend that irresponsible policies from the other side were anything but. Had Spendapalooza passed, it would have increased inflation even more than it was.

 

[lpetrich]

Senator Joe Manchin Farewell Address | C-SPAN.org - December 3, 2024

Manchin‘s final Senate remarks: distaste for political party hostility and an ode to his houseboat • West Virginia Watch - December 4, 2024 6:00 am - "‘We’ve got to stop demonizing each other,’ said Joe Manchin, who is leaving the U.S. Senate after 14 years."

Joe Manchin speaks about Biden, his past and the future of his former party | Semafor - Dec 12, 2024, 1:08pm PST
politics

Joe Manchin was closer to running for president than you might think.

The ultimate dealbreaker wasn’t the immense odds against him. It was ballot access.

“If we had a pathway forward to get on 50 ballots, oh, I’d have been a go,” the retiring senator told Semafor during a reflective interview this week as his aides began packing his office.

Another factor weighing on him: “No matter what” effect he had on the 2024 election, history would have dubbed him a “spoiler” who had “no chance of winning,” he said.

What did he expect?

I marvel at the naivete of many supporters of third-party and independent Presidential runs. Haven't they ever heard of Duverger's law?

Joe Manchin: West Virginia senator torches Democrats on the way out the door | CNN Politics - 5:57 PM EST, Sun December 22, 2024

“The D-brand has been so maligned from the standpoint of, it’s just, it’s toxic,” Manchin told CNN’s Manu Raju in an interview that aired Sunday, citing the shift as the reason why he left the party.

Adding that he no longer considers himself a Democrat “in the form of what Democratic Party has turned itself into,” Manchin — who has long been a pivotal swing vote in the Senate — said the party’s brand has become about telling people what they can and can’t do, blaming progressives for the change.

Sen. Joe Manchin says he believes Senate is "not going to let the filibuster blow apart" - CBS News - Dec 22, 2024

Even if it means Democrats obstructing Republicans?

 

[lpetrich]

The Kyrsten Sinema exit interview | Semafor

After Donald Trump won the presidency and Republicans claimed the Senate, Kyrsten Sinema got an unexpected message about her insistence on protecting the filibuster.

“One person reached out to me after the election and apologized — and said I was right. One Democratic senator,” Sinema told Semafor in an interview this week in her pink-hued hideaway office beneath the Capitol. “I was surprised about that one. I was very surprised. And I appreciate it.”

... And despite the criticism her stance elicited from Democrats on and off the Hill, Sinema said that her 2022 opposition to changing the filibuster was the “most important vote I’ve ever taken in my life.”

Seems like the Republicans are likely to weaken it even further if the Democrats use it.

In only a single term, Sinema has played an unusually integral role in bipartisan deals both big and small, on everything from infrastructure to gun safety to run-of-the-mill Senate floor operations.

So she deserves some credit for being diligent.

She voted just last week to block President Joe Biden’s reappointment of a top labor board nominee and shrugged off the resulting criticism from the left in typical fashion: “Don’t give a shit.”

Without giving any reason for her vote.

 

[lpetrich]

KS isn't nearly as talkative as JM, and she claims that anyone who has questions about what she thinks is “not paying attention.” continuing with “I know some people think I’m, like, this enigma or whatever, but I don’t think that’s true at all. I think, maybe, this is a place where sometimes people say things that they don’t mean. I am not one of those people … I think I’m highly predictable.”

IMO, she brought it on herself by not being very talkative, to the point that some people tried to interpret her choices in clothing. That is a big shift from her pre-Congress years, when she was very talkative.

From the article, "She did confirm that she’s done with politics after a lengthy career in state politics and then in Congress, first as a House member."

Kyrsten Sinema - Ballotpedia

• 2019-2024: U.S. senator from Arizona
• 2013-2019: U.S. representative from Arizona's 9th Congressional District
• 2012: Graduated from Arizona State University with a Ph.D.
• 2011-2012: Arizona State Senate
• 2006-present: Instructor, Center for Progressive Leadership
• 2005-present: Attorney
• 2005-2011: Arizona House of Representatives
• 2004: Graduated from Arizona State University with a J.D.
• 1999: Graduated from Arizona State University with a M.S.
• 1995-2002: Social worker
• 1995: Graduated from Brigham Young University with a B.A.

So it's AZ State House 6 yr, AZ State Senate 2 yr, US House 6 yr, US Senate 6 yr -- 20 years in politics.

 

[lpetrich]

Back to Semafor. She prides herself on what she got done. “Honestly, I feel like we got 40 years worth of work done in one term. I do wish we had gotten immigration done. We tried really hard, but everything else was just pretty freaking amazing.” Donald Trump sank that border-security bill because he wanted that to be an issue to use against the Democrats.

She said her decision not to run wasn’t based on the border bill’s demise, but it was hard not to see that moment as a nadir for the Senate’s once-mighty dealmaker class. The roving band of centrists in both parties who championed cross-aisle negotiations had a remarkable run in a 50-50 Senate amid Democratic control of Washington and two party-line spending bills, beginning in 2021 with the bipartisan infrastructure law.

They followed that victory with successful passage of legislation on microchip manufacturing, gun safety and same-sex marriage.

Once Republicans controlled the House in 2023, though, dealmakers were marginalized. The original 10 senators who got together to write the infrastructure bill dined as a group on Wednesday night, their last hurrah before several more of them retired this year.

Despite her successes,

She also made life harder for herself politically by spurning big Democratic initiatives like raising the minimum wage, weakening the filibuster and raising tax rates. Given that iconoclasm, it’s not clear to me she ever really prioritized reelection, regardless of what Gallego did.

Sinema appears to have made a calculation to do things her way, consequences be damned.

That's Ruben Gallego, her successor in her Senate seat.

And when she shuts you down, she still has a sense of humor. After she skirted my question on her presidential vote, I observed that she can be tough to interview.

Her reply: “Imagine how hard it is to write a speech for me.”

 

[lpetrich]

Kyrsten Sinema defends filibuster in farewell address to Senate

“When holding political power and feeling the hunger and pressure for an immediate partisan win, it is easy to view the legislative filibuster as a weapon of obstruction,” Sinema said in her farewell speech. “It is tempting to prefer elimination of the filibuster to compromise.”

“It certainly feels faster, easier, and more satisfying, at least in the short term, that is, but there are dangers to choosing short-term victories over the hard — and necessary — work of building consensus,” she continued.

“To give in to the temptation of the short-term victory means giving into the chaos caused by the constant ricocheting of laws, or it means you labor under an illusion that by eliminating the filibuster you’ll maintain political power forever, effectively ending our two-party system. That’s a fallacy, and worse, it’s scary. One-party rule is not democracy, that’s autocracy. That’s not the system our forefathers envisioned, and it’s not what our country deserves.”

However, the U.S. House has no filibuster rule — legislation there needs only a simple majority to pass.

Dumb. It makes obstruction too easy. I'd save supermajorities for big things.

But why 60%? Why not 66.7%? 75%? 80%? 95%? 99%? 100%? Yes, unanimity. Poland's early-modern parliament, the Seim, had a rule called the  Liberum veto where anyone can veto anything, effectively requiring unanimity.

As we approach the 119th Congress, Republicans will control the presidency, the Senate, and the House, and sadly I’m already hearing rumors of a hunger to subvert these norms, indeed to use reconciliation as a tool to circumvent the filibuster,” she said. “But the end result of that short-sighted action would be the same.

“As history has shown, abusing or eliminating one tool for short-term gain means the other party will do the same when it regains political power. It is a devolution.”

I must give her credit for her willingness to criticize Republicans.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

I'd give a fuck what she thought is she ever actually cared to tell us what she thought. Sen. Sinema was not remotely vocal, didn't appear to have any particular principles that she was defending. She just did. I could appreciate he position being a Democrat Senator in a reddish-purple state. I could appreciate her hedging to the right. But she never communicated remotely near enough to explain her position (or even what her position was). And that was annoying. And for her to talking about principles when she just didn't talk about it when Senator is very annoying.

The filibuster is a tool that gives the minority serious amounts of power. And each party has been the minority and they realize just how easy it'd be to undo legislation without a filibuster in hand.

 

[lpetrich]

Eight times Kyrsten Sinema let down the LGBTQ+ community — and others - 01/24/25 (earlier: Kyrsten Sinema defends filibuster in farewell address to Senate - December 26 2024 7:48 PM EST)

1. Equality Act stalled - this act "would have outlawed anti-LGBTQ+ discrimination nationwide in employment, housing, public accommodations, and more".

2. Voting rights didn’t pass because of filibuster - it was "designed to override restrictions adopted in several states".

3. The filibuster blocked reproductive rights too - the "Women’s Health Protection Act, meant to write the right to abortion into federal law"

4. Voting against raise in minimum wage - "In 2021, Sinema voted against a provision in the coronavirus relief package that would have increased the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour." - Complete with a very theatrical curtsy.

5. Criticism of her spending on travel and more - she “has filled her campaign coffers with Wall Street cash — but some donors are miffed she’s spent more than $100,000 of it on luxury hotels, private jets, limos and fine wines”

6. Coziness with Mitch McConnell - KS: “In today’s partisan Washington, it might shock some that a Democratic senator would consider the Republican leader of the Senate her friend. But back home in Arizona, we don’t view life through a partisan lens.” MMC: “I’ve only known Kyrsten for four years, but she is, in my view — and I’ve told her this — the most effective first-term senator I’ve seen in my time in the Senate. She is, today, what we have too few of in the Democratic Party: a genuine moderate and a dealmaker.”

7. Calling Democrats “old dudes ... eating Jell-O” - "Once she became an independent, Sinema spent some time ridiculing Democrats in front of Republican audiences." - once saying that Democratic caucus meetings had “old dudes are eating Jell-O, everyone is talking about how great they are. I don’t really need to be there for that. That’s an hour and a half twice a week that I can get back.” (Can't?) She also called House liberals "crazy people" and she spoke of Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer “in harshly critical terms.”

8. Hiring Tulsi Gabbard’s sister for security

 

[lpetrich]

“Don’t Give a Sh*t”: Kyrsten Sinema Gives Wildest Exit Interview | The New Republic - December 20, 2024/11:05 a.m. ET

“Honestly, I feel like we got 40 years’ worth of work done in one term,” she continued. “I do wish we had gotten immigration done. We tried really hard, but everything else was just pretty freaking amazing.”

Again, this from the woman who was often absent from key Democratic votes to go run in an Ironman or work at some winery. She noted that she (thankfully) is done running for public office. We’ll see what kind of chaos she can cause next in the consulting and lobbying world.

Kyrsten Sinema is leaving Congress and has a few things to say | PBS News - Dec 31, 2024 10:47 AM EDT

Since joining the Senate, she has been more disciplined and careful in what she says in public, on or off the record. Frustratingly so.

To the point that some people try to interpret her wardrobe. She could have asked her good friend Joe Manchin about how to be talkative in politics.

As you’ll read, she bluntly dodged some questions I expected answers to – including how the men of the Senate see women there – but was sharply direct on others, like how she differs from Nancy Pelosi on Capitol Hill.

Then

(interviewer Lisa DesJardins) The immigration bill … I know you still hope that parts of that will be passed. … What, in the end, do you think happened there?

We had like 24 votes on the Republican side. And [then-]candidate Trump decided that he would rather deal with this after his election. And senators, all of whom get to make their own decisions, chose to not move forward.

It says something about the Republican Party that Republican politicians are so submissive to Donald Trump.

I like to be pragmatic and practical and actually get stuff done. I want to solve real problems for real people. I think I did that. I mean, you know, not everything I wanted.

... And I think the solution is to be free of ideology. Ideology is not particularly useful. Like, it doesn’t move the ball. It doesn’t solve problems. And that’s what I stand for.

But does she have any goals beyond that? Even goals like pleasing her biggest donors?

LDJ: Two criticisms of you. One is that you were beholden to donors, especially investment donors, especially Wall Street donors. How do you respond to that?

KS: Well, I think it should be fairly clear that I’m beholden to no one. So, there you go.

The Francis Bacon defense. He was once a judge, but when he was caught taking bribes from his clients, he offered up the defense that he indeed accepted those bribes, but that he didn't like those bribes influence him.

LDJ: The other is the idea that you left the party for political reasons. Why not a Democrat? Why independent?

KS: You know, when I first started in politics, I was not a Democrat. I was independent when I first started. It didn’t work. And so at the time, I joined the party that was most closely aligned with my values. And then there came a day when I did not feel like that alignment worked.

She was a Green for a while (!)

LDJ: What do you feel like your impact was on the Senate?

KS: I think my biggest impact was to save the filibuster, which I’m, again, incredibly proud of.

What a thing to brag about.

LDJ: Are you closed to returning to elected office? What are you doing next?

KS: I will not run again.

Just as well. She didn't get a lot of support when she ran for re-election last year -- neither Democrats nor Republicans liked her very much, and that alleged big population of centrist pragmatists didn't show up for her.

 

[lpetrich]

CREW files complaint against Kyrsten Sinema - CREW | Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington - December 18, 2024

Senator Kyrsten Sinema appears to have used her campaign to pay for personal expenses, including trips to Europe and California wine country, according to a complaint filed today by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington with the Federal Election Commission.

...
In the incident possibly furthest from campaigning, three weeks after Sinema announced she would not run again, her campaign spent more than $3,000 in Rome and Milan, Italy. The complaint also identified suspicious spending around the Boston Marathon, which is not the first time Sinema has spent campaign funds around it.

Kyrsten Sinema Spent Campaign Cash on French Castle Stay - December 20 2024, 5:00 a.m. - "The Arizona senator’s prodigious campaign spending in global wine hot spots can’t possibly be related to the campaign she’s not running, says an ethics complaint."

The expenses, according to the CREW complaint, include trips to various locations spread across several months that include:

• $3,120 to vendors in Italy in March, including a hotel in Milan and a restaurant steps from the Pantheon in Rome
• Nearly $9,000 to vendors in Massachusetts around the time of the Boston Marathon in April, which Sinema, a fitness buff, has participated in before
• $15,000 of spending in California and Colorado over the summer in locations that included Three Sticks Wines, a winery where Sinema has both interned and courted private equity donors
• $82,000 in a grab bag of travel expenses this year that include $3,600 in the United Kingdom and $5,400 in France, including $2,800 at the Castel de Très Girard in the wine region of Burgundy

CREW said that despite “an extensive search of the public record,” it was unable to find evidence that the expenses related to official congressional duties or to campaign activities.

She wasn't running, so the least she could have done with it was to support the campaigns of candidates that she likes.