Don't want to jinx it
But Kyrsten Sinema's pulled ahead in the AZ senate count, and as of today, her margin is increasing. And the majority of the votes left to count come from Maricopa and Pima counties, which are the state's Democratic strongholds (for Arizona values of Democratic stronghold.) They won't finish counting all the mail-in votes till Monday at the earliest, so things could still change, and there's always the looming spectre of a recount, but there's a glimmer of hope. You can tell how much of a glimmer by the fact that the AZ Republican Party has suddenly launched a lawsuit claiming that it's unfair that some counties have different cutoff dates for mailing in ballots than others (and guess which counties have the "unfair" cutoff dates?) and trying to get a bunch of ballots disqualified. As they didn't give a crap about this supposed "unfairness" when their candidate was ahead, this is as naked an attempt at voter suppression for partisan gain as I can recall in this state. It is to be hoped that the thing gets thrown out of court. (I mean, I can totally see an argument for statewide consistency in the future, absolutely, but changing the rules after people mailed in their ballots is bull.)
And Kathy Hoffman, the Democrat running for Superintendent of Public Instruction, has pulled ahead by an even larger margin than Sinema, which is HUGE for AZ schools. (There's a third statewide office where a Democrat's pulled ahead, but I can't remember which one it was -- something relatively minor.)
I can't say I'm not disappointed that we didn't get the state attorney general and the Corporation Commission, but the margins there were within a couple of points -- far closer than they have been in the past. I don't think there was any chance we could have got governor, because David Garcia frankly ran a terrible campaign. I don't know if he was underfunded or just unprepared and uncoordinated, but he didn't fight back effectively against the unrelenting barrage of we're-not-even-bothering-to-hide-the-racism attack ads run against him.
Even if Sinema and Hoffman don't end up winning, I think the closeness of the contests this year may actually be a sign of things to come. People have been talking about turning Arizona blue for so long, and it's kept not happening. There's still a long hard slog ahead, but maybe, just maybe, we've finally hit a tipping point.
Rants Talk to me
And Kathy Hoffman, the Democrat running for Superintendent of Public Instruction, has pulled ahead by an even larger margin than Sinema, which is HUGE for AZ schools. (There's a third statewide office where a Democrat's pulled ahead, but I can't remember which one it was -- something relatively minor.)
I can't say I'm not disappointed that we didn't get the state attorney general and the Corporation Commission, but the margins there were within a couple of points -- far closer than they have been in the past. I don't think there was any chance we could have got governor, because David Garcia frankly ran a terrible campaign. I don't know if he was underfunded or just unprepared and uncoordinated, but he didn't fight back effectively against the unrelenting barrage of we're-not-even-bothering-to-hide-the-racism attack ads run against him.
Even if Sinema and Hoffman don't end up winning, I think the closeness of the contests this year may actually be a sign of things to come. People have been talking about turning Arizona blue for so long, and it's kept not happening. There's still a long hard slog ahead, but maybe, just maybe, we've finally hit a tipping point.
Rants Talk to me