Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) announced his long-awaited 2024 United States Senate bid on Monday morning, setting up a face-off against newly independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (AZ).
Gallego is a liberal former Marine combat veteran who has been “encouraged” to run for Senate against Sinema by Democrat senators. He announced his bid after being one of Sinema’s more vocal critics.
After being in the House of Representatives since 2015, he announced his candidacy in a video in English and Spanish that stressed his military service and experience growing up as a first-generation American with a single mother.
“The rich and the powerful, they don’t need more advocates,” Gallego said in the video, following a clip of him addressing veterans about his plans to run for Senate. “It’s the people that are still trying to decide between groceries and utilities that need a fighter for them.”
Growing up poor, all I had was the American dream. It kept me going: as a kid sleeping on the floor, a student scrubbing toilets, a Marine losing brothers in Iraq.
Today, too many Arizonans see their dream slipping away. I’m running for the U.S. Senate to win it back for you! pic.twitter.com/ofUvUYRcTP
— Ruben Gallego (@RubenGallego) January 23, 2023
In a statement, he also took aim at Sinema, saying she has “abandoned Arizona” and has “repeatedly broken her promises and fought for the interests of big pharma and Wall Street at our expense.”
For weeks leading up to Gallego’s announcement, reports had shown that the congressman had been interviewing and hiring the necessary people to make a run against the Sinema. He also chairs BOLD PAC, the political arm of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, which will likely help him raise large sums of money.
Despite all of this, Sinema has yet to make an official announcement on whether she will run for reelection or not, in addition to if it would be in the Democrat primary or as a third party candidate, which would cause a split ticket on election night, giving the upper hand to a strong Republican candidate.
However, she has filed campaign papers with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) for the 2024 election cycle, noting her recent party change to allow her committee to continue fundraising while she makes a decision.
If Sinema runs in the Democrat primary, she could potentially run as a third-party candidate after the primary if she loses. But running as a third-party candidate would also have the potential to split the votes and help elect a Republican. Last month, Politico explained one option that would allow the Arizona senator’s party switch not to cause a contested Democrat primary but could end up causing a “nightmare scenario” for the party:
With three candidates on the ballot, a GOP nominee can capitalize on centrist and liberal divisions and win a Senate seat with a plurality vote. Democrats are not eager to intervene at the moment, but at some point they may have to make a call about whether to support Sinema, back whoever wins a primary or sit out the race altogether.
So, with only a slim 51-seat majority, the Democrat Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC), the Senate Democrats’ campaign arm, will not only have to try to keep the 51-seat majority but will also potentially have to spend millions of dollars protecting Sinema if they want to protect her since she has been a valuable asset for the left, in addition to some Democrat senators running in states that have turned redder in recent years.
Axios also noted that the last cycle’s results point to Arizona voters preferring moderate candidates, which would ultimately help Sinema. Voters last cycle that did not go outside the “political norms” did better in the election. The state is also split pretty evenly between Democratic, Republican, and independent voters.
Jacob Bliss is a reporter for Breitbart News. Write to him at jbliss@breitbart.com or follow him on Twitter @JacobMBliss.
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