Arizona Turning Blue

In the New York Times, John McCain's home state of Arizona is not in his safe column.

But a variety of factors have made Mr. McCain’s chances in Arizona less assured than they ordinarily would seem, which his campaign has acknowledged.

The number of independent voters in Arizona has risen 12 percent since 2004, and those voters have helped send a Democrat to the governor’s mansion and given the party four of the state’s eight Congressional seats — including two in 2006, one in a historically Republican district.

At the same time, Arizona Democrats, like many of their counterparts around the country, have outpaced Republicans in voter registration, adding almost 20,000 voters to the rolls since March, compared with the Republican majority’s 8,600 new voters. The second-term Democratic governor, Janet Napolitano, remains wildly popular.

And Democrats are not going to cede the state to McCain, either:

“John McCain has striking vulnerabilities here,” said Emily DeRose, spokeswoman for the Arizona Democratic Party. “We are going to take him to the mat. We are not giving him a pass in Arizona.”

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