Democrat Kyrsten Sinema expands lead over Republican Martha McSally in Arizona Senate race

(Image credit: AP Photo/Matt York)

last updated 2 November 2018

Democratic Rep. Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.) has opened up a 6-point lead over GOP rival Rep. Martha McSally in Arizona's hard-fought Senate race, according to a new NBC News/Marist poll released Tuesday. In the same poll last month, Sinema led McSally by 3 points, 48 percent to 45 percent. Her current 50 percent to 44 percent lead among likely voters slips to 3 points when Green Party candidate Angela Green is included, Marist found.

Sinema's lead is fueled by lopsided support from women, Latinos, and independents. It is within the poll's ±5.4 percentage points margin of error for likely voters, and the RealClearPolitics average of polls, which doesn't include this one, has McSally up 0.7 points. "Arizona may play a pivotal role in determining the makeup of the next Senate," says Marists's Lee Miringoff. "Right now, the contest is very competitive." The poll was conducted by phone Oct. 23-27 among 793 registered voters and 506 likely voters, 44 percent of whom said they have already voted.

Lauren Passalacqua, communications director for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, tells FiveThirtyEight that this is "an exciting race because this is the first election cycle where you're seeing a lot of resources pulled into the state. Democrats closed the registration advantage that Republicans had." FiveThirtyEight gives Sinema a 5 in 8 shot at beating McSally, but Republican strategist Josh Holmes argues that "Sinema has taken on an awful lot of water in the last couple of weeks, and "it's still a very tight race. Republicans, to a person, feel like we have a superior candidate with better credentials and a better fit ideologically for the state."

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.