The Intercept - Kyrsten Sinema’s betrayal of democracy

When Big Pharma set out to kill President Joe Biden’s plan to lower prescription drug prices, The Intercept reported on how Sen. Kyrsten Sinema came to the industry’s aid and cashed in with big campaign checks.

And when Sinema helped big corporations block corporate tax increases while pocketing hundreds of thousands from companies like Verizon in campaign contributions, The Intercept called her out.

And as Sinema helped sink Biden’s Build Back Better bill in the Senate, The Intercept uncovered emails from the Wall Street-funded group No Labels calling her efforts “heroic.”

So when she stood with Republicans and helped block voting rights legislation, readers of The Intercept weren’t surprised — and we won’t stop holding politicians like Sinema accountable for putting corporations ahead of their constituents.

Every day, The Intercept’s investigative reporters are following the money to expose how corporate influence has corrupted our democracy and fueled obstructionism in Congress. We rely on reader support to power this fearless, in-depth journalism — will you make a donation today?

When the Senate took up voting rights legislation this week, plenty of ink was spilled on Sinema, a Democrat from Arizona, who dashed the hopes of her own party by refusing to support reforming the filibuster to allow voting rights to move forward.

Her stance — along with that of Sen. Joe Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat — means that 60 votes are required to pass voting rights legislation. So despite being supported by a majority of Americans, including Arizonans, the legislation was doomed to fail.

Much of the inside-the-Beltway press coverage of Manchin and Sinema describes them as moderates or centrists, leaving viewers wondering why Democrats can’t just compromise.

At the Intercept, we’re following the money to show Arizonans and the country what’s really going on: Sinema is no moderate — she’s colluding with the corporate right and using her leverage to cash in.

Sinema has close ties to No Labels, the dark-money group funded by Wall Street. She’s gotten oodles of cash from corporate donors outside Arizona, including from several big-time Republican givers. And she’s devoted to this time-consuming, strings-attached corporate fundraising strategy even though it’s less efficient than raising money from the grassroots.

The American people and the people of Arizona deserve to know what’s really going on. The Intercept and its fearless team of investigative journalists are determined to tell them.

The Intercept is committed to following the money, but we rely on individual donations to fund our work. Will you make a contribution to fund our investigative journalism to expose big money in politics?

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