Democrats flip US Senate seat in Arizona
WASHINGTON: Arizona Republican Martha McSally conceded her razor- thin US Senate race Monday, providing Democrats with a key pickup in a state that has not elected a member of the party to the Senate in three decades.
“I just called Kyrsten Sinema and congratulated her on becoming Arizona’s first female senator after a hard-fought battle,” McSally said in a video statement posted on her Twitter account.
“I wish her all success as she represents Arizona in the Senate.”
US networks Fox and CNN called the race in Sinema’s favor. She will replace outgoing Senator Jeff Flake, a conservative Republican who is a critic of President Donald Trump.
Arizona is a border state with increasing numbers of Latino immigrants. The issue is front and centre in statewide elections there, and Trump has triggered a sense of nativism among his supporters.
But Sinema sought to focus on kitchen- table issues like health care, and Democrats’ push to preserve protections for people with pre- existing conditions.
Democrats, who reclaimed control of the House of Representatives in the midterms, have now flipped two Senate seats: Arizona and Nevada.
Republicans gained Senate seats in Indiana, Missouri and North Dakota.
The victory by Sinema, an Arizona congresswoman, will provide Democrats a critical extra vote in the 100- member chamber, which Republicans will still control when the dust settles from last week’s closely-watched midterm elections.
With almost all ballots counted from the Nov 6 election, Sinema had expanded her lead each of the last four days. On Monday evening Sinema was ahead by 38,197 votes, or 1.72 percentage points.
Trump weighed in on the Arizona race after the election, crying foul when authorities took days to count ballots and used a procedure that allowed voters to confirm their signatures in cases where there were discrepancies.