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Kyrsten Sinema, at a get-out-the-vote event at the Arizona Education Association headquarters in Phoenix, Australia, Saturday, Nov. 3, 2018. Sinema is facing Republican Martha McSally the race to replace Republican Sen. Jeff Flake, who is retiring. lessKyrsten Sinema, candidate for the Democratic Union of the United States, is a member of the Arizona Education Association's headquarters in Phoenix, Saturday, Nov. 3, … more
Photo: Bob Christie, AP
Photo: Bob Christie, AP
PHOENIX (AP) – A contentious race that will end with Arizona's first female U.S. senator and a governor's race featuring Republican Doug Ducey against Democracy's challenger David Garcia as Ducey seeks a second term in the 2018 general election.
The race to replace retiring GOP Sen. Jeff Flake pits Democrat Kyrsten Sinema against Republican Martha McSally.
The contest is more than $ 90 million in spending, including more than $ 58 million by outside groups, depending on the Federal Election Commission reports. That jaw-dropping number is no surprise to any Arizona residents who have turned on their TVs or listened to radios in the past several months. The ads clog the airwaves.
The Senate is one of the most competitive countries in the world. The three-term congresswoman currently represents Phoenix and Tempe.
McSally has focused on border security and boosting the nation's military while attacking Sinema, labeling her as a leftist who is too radical for Arizona. McSally is a Tucson-area Congressional Air Force pilot and has a strong Trump backer.
Sinema has still focused attention on McSally's 2017 vote to repel the Affordable Care Act, saying the action shows she will not protect patients with pre-existing conditions. But McSally now says she would protect those patients.
If Sinema wins, it will be a sign that Arizona is in play as a swing state, and she will become the first democratic senator since the mid-1990s.
In the governor's race, Ducey has focused on border security, a booming state economy and the need to remain focused on making the state's business climate better to boost job growth.
He has seen several times more than 75,000 teachers in the United States.
Garcia has focused on the state of underfunded schools while attacking Ducey for what he says is his failure to prioritize school funding. He's taken a different tack than Sinema, running as a progressive candidate, coming out against Trump's plans for a border wallet and calling for more humane treatment of immigrants, especially children. The Democrat said he would like to see Immigration and Customs.
That led to Ducey's attacks, and public polling shows the governor with a strong lead as Election Day nears.
All the Arizona seats in Congress are also on the ballot, with Democrats hoping to pick up southern Arizona's 2nd Congressional District seat, being vacated by McSally.
Former Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick, a Democrat, is taking over Republican Lea Marquez Peterson. Democrats are working to hold the 1st and 9th districts, which is where it is, to bring the Democratic-GOP back to 5-4 if Kirkpatrick prevails.
The 8th District in northeastern Phoenix features a rematch of an April election election that saw Republican Debbie Lesko narrowly beat Democrat Hiral Tipirneni. That district features a heavy Republican registration advantage, so Lesko is favored, but Tipirneni is campaigning hard and thinks she could win.
"We know that we are out there every day," she said in a recent interview. "We're having independents continue to engage with us, moderate Republicans, and we've been moving forward."
The other five districts, three held by Republicans and two by Democrats, are not seen as competitive. Still, Democrats have fielded candidates in the GOP-heavy districts, a rarity for those districts.
Also on the ballot are the other statewide offices: state secretary, attorney general, treasurer and superintendent of public instruction. All are seen as competitive for one party. And two seats on the Corporation Commission, the five-member body that regulates utilities, are on the ballot, with two Democrats running against two Republicans.
Five proposals have been made before, including 305 proposals, which has been approved by the Legislature and Gov. Ducey in 2017 over unified opposition from Democrats. Public school advocates collected enough signatures to put the law on hold pending a statewide vote, and a no vote rejects the law.
The other top ballot measure is a vote initiative known as Proposal 127, which would require utilities to get 50 percent of their power from renewable resources like solar by 2030. Tom Steyer's NextGen America PAC.
Three other measures would be new taxes on services, and some of the costs would increase in two states pensions, those for corrections officers and elected officials.
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For AP's complete coverage of the U.S. midterm elections: http://apne.ws/APPolitics
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