U.S. Senator Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona said on Friday that she has changed her political party allegiance to independent, abandoning the Democratic Party just days after it gained a U.S. Senate seat. The Georgia Senate fought to secure 51 seats in the chamber.
“I have joined the growing numbers of Arizonans who reject party politics by declaring my independence from the broken partisan system in Washington. I registered as an Arizona independent,” she said in an op-ed for local media outlet Arizona Central.
In a separate Politico interview published on Friday, Sinema stated that she will not caucus with the Republican Party. If this holds, Democrats may still be able to maintain greater governing control in the tightly divided house.
Democrats faced a 50-50 tie in the Senate with U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris casting the deciding vote. U.S. Senator Raphael Warnock’s victory in Georgia’s run-off election on Tuesday gave them their 51st seat.
Two additional current senators, Vermont’s Bernie Sanders and Maine’s Angus King, are registered independents who normally caucus with Democrats.
Sinema on Friday said her shift came as a growing number of people in her Western U.S. state were also declaring themselves politically independent, rejecting both the Republican and Democratic political labels.
“Like a lot of Arizonans, I have never fit perfectly in either national party,” She wrote.
