Once again, Sen. Krysten Sinema has proven herself a foil to the Democratic Party’s liberal plans — and thank goodness.
The Arizona Democrat announced on Wednesday that she will not support Democrats’ proposed $3.5 trillion reconciliation package, which has been stuffed full of left-wing priorities that range from free child care to an expansion of Medicare. Sinema didn’t say she had a problem with any one of the specific policies included in the package, but she did take issue with its overall cost.
“While I will support beginning this process, I do not support a bill that costs $3.5 trillion — and in the coming months, I will work in good faith to develop this legislation with my colleagues and the administration to strengthen Arizona’s economy and help Arizona’s everyday families get ahead,” she said in a statement.
Democrats don’t have a vote to spare in the Senate if they hope to get this bill passed. So, unless Sinema is just paying lip service to her contrarian tendencies and plans to fall in line, Democrats are in trouble here. They’re going to have to find a way to lower the price of the mammoth legislative package, and that will inevitably mean cutting certain priorities, or at least scaling those priorities back.
The leftists in Congress are predictably peeved with Sinema, as they usually are. And Republicans are understandably pleased that at least one Democrat in the chamber has enough common sense not to let the federal government spend its way into a runaway inflation crisis. But she’ll face a lot of pressure from her party, and without the support of the other Democratic centrist in the Senate, Joe Manchin, Sinema’s line will be a tough one to walk.
Even so, she’s proven before that she doesn’t mind getting in the way of her party’s liberal ambitions. In fact, she seems to enjoy it.
