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This message comes from NPR

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sponsor The Nature Conservancy. By

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isles, The Nature Conservancy is

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delivering solutions for the planet

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and building a future where

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people and nature thrive. Learn

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more at nature.org/solutions. Hi,

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this is Mark. And this is

0:22

Juliana from Sharon, Massachusetts. We're

0:24

currently in Tromsø, Norway, where it's almost

0:26

midnight. We just finished running the

0:28

Midnight Sun half marathon on a

0:31

bright sunny night, surrounded by beautiful snow-capped

0:33

mountains along the ocean. This

0:35

show was recorded at 12.35pm ET on Monday, June 24, 2024. Things

0:41

may have changed by the time you hear this, but

0:44

we'll still be trying to remember what darkness looks like,

0:46

since we haven't seen it for over two weeks now.

0:49

Okay, here's the show. I'm

0:55

pretty sure that would break my brain. It

0:58

sounds so pleasant, though. That's why I sleep with

1:00

one of those, like, Nod Pod eye masks. Yeah.

1:03

I feel like you come up with tricks, you

1:05

know, if you have to live with that much light. Gotta

1:07

sleep. Yeah. Hey there,

1:10

it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Ashley

1:12

Lopez. I cover politics. I'm Claudia Grisales.

1:14

I cover Congress. And I'm Domenico Montanaro,

1:16

senior political editor and correspondent. And today we're

1:18

talking about Arizona, which is among one of

1:20

the most interesting states in the country right

1:22

now. It's a presidential battleground.

1:24

It has a must-win Senate race

1:26

for Democrats. And a huge

1:29

number of its voters happen to identify

1:31

as independents. Claudia, you're back from a

1:33

trip there, and you focused on those

1:36

independent voters. What did you find when

1:38

you talked to folks there? Right. I

1:40

found that independent voters in Arizona will

1:43

have a big say on these races,

1:45

with national implications, as you mentioned. And

1:48

they are a very large share

1:50

of the state. More than one-third

1:52

of registered voters are independent voters.

1:55

And I was looking over the state's secretary of

1:57

state numbers in terms of where they stand. stand

2:01

now last year, they actually

2:03

were the largest registered group

2:05

in Arizona. So the largest

2:07

party is not a party

2:09

at all in Arizona. And

2:11

that was the first time we saw that in

2:14

Arizona since 2015. Now

2:16

this year we've seen Republicans edge them

2:18

out a little bit, according to the

2:21

most recent numbers released in April, but

2:23

I did talk to voters who thought

2:25

that perhaps independent voters will edge them

2:27

out again by the time of the

2:30

election, this is something they're still tracking.

2:33

And overall, these independent voters say they're going

2:35

to have that big impact on these races

2:37

and they are a wild card. It's hard

2:39

to track where they are and candidates have

2:41

to shift and pivot as best they can

2:43

to try and capture them. And Domenico, I

2:46

think like there's a common assumption that when

2:48

we're talking about independent voters, we're talking about

2:50

swing voters or persuadable voters, people who haven't

2:52

figured out how they're going to vote. But

2:54

that's like not really the case here, right?

2:57

Well, it's never really the case because people

3:00

mostly are, they vote Republican or

3:02

they vote Democratic. So we're talking

3:04

about Republican leaning independence for the

3:06

most part, or Democratic leaning independence

3:08

for the most part with a

3:11

very narrow slice of people who

3:13

are truly persuadable. I will say

3:15

though, that Arizona, Nevada, places like

3:17

that, their politics definitely cross some

3:19

typical lines. It's not like

3:21

you can say a Republican in Arizona, you

3:23

know, or an independent in Arizona is the

3:25

same as an independent in Michigan or

3:27

something like that. I remember even when

3:30

Kirsten Sinema was running for reelection, she

3:32

was running ads as independent, even though

3:34

at that time she was a registered

3:36

Democrat. So independents have always

3:39

been a really key, I would say the

3:41

key group in Arizona.

3:43

And while they may be the

3:45

largest registered party group currently, and

3:47

the first time since 2015 when

3:50

it comes to party registration, when

3:52

it comes to voting, they have

3:54

been the plurality group for the

3:56

last several cycles. In 2016, for

3:58

example, according to exit polls. They were 40% of

4:00

the electorate. They broke

4:03

by three points for Trump and Trump won

4:05

the state that year. In 2020, they

4:07

were 39% of the of

4:10

the electorate and Biden won them over

4:12

Trump by nine. So definitely a key

4:15

group. Yeah. And Claudia, I mean, I

4:17

think it's interesting that they don't really

4:19

have much of a structural way to

4:22

participate in primaries and actually help select

4:24

like the people who end up getting

4:26

on the ballot for a general election.

4:29

Can you talk to me about that?

4:31

Yes, exactly. That is the complaint. I

4:33

heard from independent voters is they are

4:36

not really reflected in terms of the

4:38

kind of candidates that they're able to

4:40

select through the various parties. I did

4:43

meet one voter, Emma Davidson. This is

4:45

a 24 year old who works collecting

4:47

signatures for various political efforts. And the

4:50

key effort she is especially interested in

4:52

because she is a former Republican turned

4:54

independent is she wants independence to get

4:57

the ability to have their own primary.

4:59

Hopefully, this does get approved. So then

5:01

more independents do vote so that we

5:03

can actually have like more options. That's

5:06

why I want it to be best

5:08

to because like more voters, better options,

5:10

more choices. And that's part of the

5:12

greater theme. I kept hearing from independent

5:14

voters is that they are not ultimately

5:16

reflected when it comes to the candidates

5:18

they get to pick from in the

5:20

end in her same case, for example,

5:22

she doesn't know who she will vote

5:24

for for sure. In the presidential race,

5:26

she just let out a big sigh

5:28

when I laid out the options and

5:30

also the Senate race and many others.

5:32

All right. Well, let's pivot to that

5:34

important Senate race for a second. Claudia,

5:37

what are the big differences you're seeing

5:39

between the Democratic and Republican candidates in

5:41

this race? Right. And we

5:43

should note there is still a primary July

5:45

30th to narrow down the final two candidates.

5:47

But it's already clear we're seeing the top

5:49

candidates on both sides. And

5:52

on the Democratic side, that's Ruben Gallego.

5:54

He has been serving in

5:56

the House for several terms now and

5:58

he is running for the Senate. tough

8:00

position this year in terms of defending that

8:02

majority, as you mentioned at the top. And

8:05

so that's why Arizona is going to be

8:07

so critical because it is a battleground. We

8:09

have two candidates who have not served in

8:12

the Senate before, and nationally

8:14

in some cases with Lake and

8:16

Gallego. And so this is going

8:18

to be a major test for

8:20

the state and for independent voters.

8:22

They have this history in that

8:24

state of sending mavericks to the

8:26

Senate like John McCain, for example,

8:28

people who will follow

8:31

kind of their own independent streak, if you

8:33

will. We saw Sinema doing that quite a

8:35

bit as she served in her time in

8:37

the Senate. And so that's what voters are

8:39

going to be looking for. And it will

8:41

be tight. So it'll be hard to say

8:43

who's going to pull that out. Yeah.

8:46

Well, let's take a quick break and we'll talk more in a

8:48

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