“That means Sarah Palin will beat you in the next election.”
Murkowski doesn’t face the voters again until 2026. By then who knows what issues will be important to Alaska voters and how she will stand on those issues. Given she has been reelected 4 times since her governor father appointed her to an open Senate seat, she must be serving Alaska voters well.
Her major problem in defecting from the party is loss of seniority unless the Democrats are willing to credit her 20+ years of seniority, thereby putting her over long time serving Democrats for perks and committee seats/chairmanships. If Dems don’t give her seniority to switch, sides, she starts at the bottom of the totem pole which would be extremely unpalatable for her ego.
In addition she today enjoys much more national media presence than Senator from a low population state normally gets because she is frequently outspoken against Trump and conservatives in the Republican Party. Plus she often defects and votes with the Democrats. Therefore she is a reliable soundbite for the leftwing reporters trying to bash Republicans in general or Trump specifically.
As Senators Jim Jeffords and Arlen Specter discovered when they defected from the GOP, the left wing press has little interest in a turncoat senator whose new junior status in the Democrat party comes with no political power. They quickly learned the Democrat politicians and liberal media who applauded your treachery in the past simply ignore you until you fade away.
Alaska deserves a real Senator. She needs to fly to a few remote communities.