Poll: Kyrsten Sinema Poised to Lose Democratic Primary in 2024
By Ryan O'Donnell, Gustavo Sanchez, and Brian Burton
Methodology
From October 8 to 10, 2021, Data for Progress conducted a survey of 467 likely Democratic primary voters in Arizona using SMS text-to-web to contact voters. Because of Arizona’s primary system, prospective respondents were Democratic and Independent voters sampled from the September 2021 version of the voter file. The responses were weighted to be representative of likely Democratic primary voters in Arizona by age, gender, education, race, and geography. The survey was conducted in English. The margin of error is ±5 percentage points, and the design effect from weighting is 1.4.
This survey relied entirely on responses from text-to-web contacts to ensure these results are most accurate for primary elections, as we find respondents who complete text-to-web surveys are more politically engaged than those who complete surveys using other modes. This higher engagement allows Data for Progress to approximate a Democratic primary electorate as closely as possible. It is also important to note that not all Democrats vote in Democratic primaries. Additionally, we report self-identified partisanship in our crosstabs rather than party registration from the voter file.
Summary of Findings
For Senator Kyrsten Sinema, her next hurdle is going to be her 2024 primary election, where she is going to have to convince Democratic primary voters in Arizona that she deserves to keep her job. Activists who are disappointed with her obstructionism and reluctance to support President Biden’s popular agenda are already organizing to draft other high profile Arizona politicians, like Rep. Ruben Gallego, to run against her in 2024. According to our new poll of likely Arizona Democratic primary voters conducted in October, using the same methodology we used in the recent New York City mayoral primary, we find that Sen. Sinema faces a steep uphill battle to defend her record and convince voters she should stay — as negative sentiment towards her continues to grow.
In terms of job approval, the gap between President Biden, Senator Mark Kelly, and Sen. Sinema is stark. Both President Biden and Sen. Kelly had a strong showing in terms of approval numbers among likely Arizona Democratic primary voters. 85 percent of these likely voters approve of the jobs that Biden and Kelly are doing in their roles, while only 25 percent approve of the job that Kyrsten Sinema is doing. Overall, Sen. Sinema’s net approval stands at -45 percentage points, with 70 percent of those voters currently disapproving of the job that she is doing. It’s important to note that she’s underwater across every demographic.
Nationally, Sen. Sinema draws comparisons to West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin, another Democratic senator with centrist ideologies and obstructionist tendencies. But the political realities in the two states just aren’t the same. West Virginia proved to be staunchly Trump-country in 2020, having selected him over President Biden by almost +40-points. But Arizona narrowly voted for Biden in 2020 — and despite a Republican-controlled state legislature, in local and statewide elections, the state trends blue. This, and the markedly higher favorability ratings of her Senate counterpart, Sen. Mark Kelly — a fellow moderate who has largely backed the Biden agenda — suggests that Sen. Sinema’s positioning as a ‘maverick’ and obstructionist may be the wrong path to re-election, and is in fact alienating primary voters.
There are many qualified Democrats in Arizona who would represent the state more effectively than Sinema, and the visual between their support of these lesser-known potential candidates and their support for Sen. Sinema is striking. There’s a caveat to this, however: while most potential candidates we tested against Sen. Sinema did well, in a hypothetical primary election challenge it would be key for progressives to consolidate behind a single challenger in order to have the best chance of defeating Sinema. At present, the only path Sinema has to win this primary appears to be by too many candidates running and splitting the vote, thus allowing her to sneak by with her clear ceiling of Democratic primary voters.
That being said, even if multiple progressive primary challengers ran, Data for Progress finds in a hypothetical that Sinema still polls behind Rep. Ruben Gallego — a clear warning sign for the Sinema campaign.
Furthermore, when voters do consolidate behind a single Senate candidate not named Kyrsten Sinema, every single polled name — even candidates with low name recognition — wins with significant margins of support. One-on-one, each potential candidate we tested beats Sinema by approximately 30 to 40 points.
It’s clear that these voters overwhelmingly support the provisions of the Build Back Better Act, and would be much more likely to vote for a candidate who supports those positions. This parallels previous Data for Progress polling, which found that the Build Back Better agenda is very popular among Arizona voters across the political spectrum — not just Democrats and Independents.
In particular, we find Arizona Democratic primary voters say they would be more likely to support a candidate who votes in favor of every major provision of the Build Back Better plan we tested. From Universal Pre-K to expanding medicare benefits, Arizona voters — those Sinema would be courting in a 2024 primary — express they are more likely to support candidates who back these Build Back Better agenda items by wide-ranging margins. Ultimately, Data for Progress finds that Arizona Democratic primary voters are most likely to support a candidate who will pass the Build Back Better Act and Democratic priorities in general — and may well unseat Sen. Sinema to make it happen.
Crosstabs
Brian Burton (@Brian_C_Burton) is a Senior Polling Analyst at Data for Progress.
Gustavo Sanchez (@lgsanchezconde) is a Principal at Data for Progress.
Ryan O’Donnell (@RyanODonnellPA) is the Electoral Director at Data for Progress.