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France, Japan and the UK: Sen. Kyrsten Sinema’s campaign is still spending big on travel
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U.S. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema piled up another pricey quarter for travel — including bills for visits to France, Japan and the United Kingdom paid by her campaign.
Sinema, I-Ariz., who announced she wouldn’t seek a second term in March, billed about $216,000 for travel between July and September, her latest campaign finance report showed. Her campaign also paid $152,000 for her security-related expenses.
The report doesn’t detail specifically where she went, why or even when, but it does show Sinema’s penchant for travel, which became part of an ethics complaint by her critics, hasn’t dimmed in her final months on the job.
It is known she attended the Olympics in Paris in August and took part in the amateur “Marathon for All” that was open to non-Olympian athletes between the men’s and women’s races.
In an interview with Arizona State University’s Cronkite News in Paris at the time, Sinema said she traveled to Paris to see the Olympics.
“I’m just so honored and privileged to be a part of an incredible event,” she said. “It’s really just a privilege to be here.”
MarathonView, which tracks marathon times for runners of all skills, showed Sinema finishing her Paris run in 4 hours, 48 minutes. It is the only listed marathon she has run this year.
In June, Sinema was in Normandy for the 80th anniversary of D-Day, the Allied forces’ invasion of France. She did so on official business as the chair of the Senate Appropriations subcommittee on Military Construction and Veterans’ Affairs, which oversees funding for the American Battle Monuments Commission, including a memorial at Normandy.
A July social media post from Tokyo-based Astroscale, a company that provides services intended for sustainable development of space, suggests Sinema visited there in some capacity.
“We’re honored to have hosted U.S. Senator Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona at our Tokyo headquarters!” the company wrote. “With the ORBITS Act of 2023 passing the Senate last November, it was inspiring to see her enthusiasm for advancing the safety, stability, security, and long-term sustainability of space.”
That refers to a bill to order the removal of space debris that easily passed the Senate. It has stalled in the House of Representatives and likely will not become law this year. Sinema was a co-sponsor of the measure.
The campaign finance report doesn’t make clear what activities were official Senate business and which were underwritten by her campaign.
Sinema’s campaign spent $4,500 for lodging, a car service, and meetings with Thai and Indian meals in London. She also spent $800 on train tickets from a German-based company, though it wasn’t clear whether she traveled to Germany as well.
Other campaign expenses were less exotic.
Sinema’s campaign paid $152,000 for her security-related expenses.
Part of her security expenses included $431 for admission to a Washington Nationals baseball game. The date for that expense corresponds to a game against the Milwaukee Brewers.
There were $4,000 in other admission tickets purchased for security, including $161 in July for the Pacific Amphitheatre in Costa Mesa, Calif.
The campaign also refunded $5,100 in earlier donations and made charitable donations totaling $6,500 to the Scottsdale Fraternal Order of Police, the Phoenix Police Foundation and Jazz Aspen Snowmass in Colorado.
The campaign ended September with nearly $5 million in cash.
Its cash total peaked at $10.8 million a year ago, when Sinema was still musing to prospective donors about a second run for the Senate.
In March, she announced she wouldn’t seek another term as her fundraising had slipped dramatically and she consistently ran a distant third in polling behind Democratic U.S. Rep. Ruben Gallego and Republican Kari Lake.
Since then, Sinema has kept a relatively low profile, though not a modest existence.
Her campaign spent at least $18,000 on overseas expenses. Of those, Sinema spent about $5,600 on meeting meals.
The expenditures suggest an operation that has continued to pay out significant money even though its primary purpose — getting Sinema into office — ended seven months ago.
Her Washington-based fundraising consultant, Fulkerson Kennedy & Co., collected $102,000 over three monthly bills. The campaign has raised $122,000 this year, nearly all of it by the end of March. In the latest quarter, Sinema’s campaign officially took in $272.
The campaign held a “Donor Thank You Event” with bills in late August and early September to Premium Seats, a ticketing company, for $80,000, though it was unclear where that happened and who was on hand.
The campaign shelled out $1,100 for “appreciation gifts” to undisclosed recipients. There was a $99 flower order for “donor appreciation.”
Cronkite News asked Sinema about America’s upcoming elections.
“I guess my message to folks across the country as we head into this next election is: Look for the candidates who want to bring people together and solve problems,” she said. “The person who’s making the most noise on Twitter is not usually the one who’s going to solve your problems.”
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