With McCain in mind, Sinema reaches for bipartisanship – By Lisa Mascaro and Nicholas Riccardi (Associated Press) / July 6 2021
WASHINGTON (AP) — More than for her shock of purple hair or unpredictable votes, Democratic Sen. Kyrsten Sinema is perhaps best known for doing the unthinkable in Washington: She spends time on the Republican side of the aisle.
Not only does she pass her days chatting up the Republican senators, she has been known to duck into their private GOP cloakroom — absolutely unheard of — and banter with the GOP leadership. She and Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell talk often by phone.
Sinema’s years in Congress have been a whirlwind of political style and perplexing substance, an antiwar liberal-turned-deal-making centrist who now finds herself at the highest levels of power. A key negotiator of the bipartisan infrastructure compromise, she was among those President Joe Biden first called to make the deal — and then called upon again as he worked furiously to salvage the agreement from collapse. A holdout to changing the Senate’s filibuster rules, she faces enormous pressure to act as voting rights in her own state and others hang in the balance.
“If anybody can pull this off it’s Kyrsten,” said David Lujan, a former Democratic colleague of Sinema’s in the Arizona statehouse. “She’s incredibly smart, so she can figure out where people’s commonalities are and get things done.”
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