A Comprehensive Review of Kyrsten Sinema's Powerfully Confounding Outfits
The Arizona Senator always looks like 1.2 trillion bucks
What makes Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema a fashion icon? A pop of fuchsia here, a pair of crutches there, a fit-n-flare silhouette always, a bomber jacket, a faux-leather bootie — all of these contribute to Sinema’s trailblazing style, of course, but nobody could pull it off quite like this waffling, frequently injured, ultramarathoning, first openly bisexual senator. She’s got that certain something, and I’m not talking about her Party City wig.
Much has been made of Sinema’s outfits, but never before has the internet seen a compilation of all of her outfits available for legal use on Getty Images reviewed by an expert, until now.
What authority do I have to write about another woman’s outfits online? I’m a girl and a blogger. Like Sinema herself, I am deeply ambivalent to choosing sides or standing for anything. But let me get ahead of the other brand of criticism here: Yes, I hate women and I don’t think they should serve in office.
Now let’s take a peek at all of Sinema’s daring looks dating back to 2018.
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September 28, 2021
Congress is back in session, and thank god for that. The United States will officially be out of cash on October 18, and I’m looking dumpy in my summer shorteralls. Someone better DO SOMETHING. I pay taxes, I think!
Rising to the occasion in both a square neckline and a puff sleeve, Sinema did EVERYTHING in this distorted floral print at a 45-minute fundraiser she hosted for lobbyists opposed to the Democrats’ proposed spending bill. Paired with an on-trend tangle of gold layered necklaces, one might even say she did TOO MUCH. I wouldn’t say that, though. The pink Nikes make her seem casual. The nurse’s mask, rather than some flouncy Etsy monstrosity, screams “civil servant” to me.
August 10, 2021
In August, Sinema wore red frames, a patterned button-up maxi-dress, one surgical boot, and one baby pink metallic sandal that is either a Skechers Shape Up sandal (purchased before the lawsuit) or some expensive thing I don’t understand.
Sinema adorns herself with wrist braces, surgical boots, and crutches so often that I did do some light “kyrsten sinema munchausen” Googling to see if something sinister was afoot. Looks like she’s just a true-blue athlete, so I’m letting it slide for now.
I like this black-and-purple look. My only note here is that she’s wearing an Apple Watch which, paired with crutches, means her step count is going to be all wrong.
July 28, 2021
Much has been memed about this photo op in which Sens. Rob Portman, Sinema, and Susan Collins enacted the weirdest tableau of all time standing at a podium together. Sinema wears a chunky turquoise beaded necklace, an orange fit-n-flare dress, and that self-same Apple Watch, which I personally would’ve taken off in front of the Senate press pool.
I’m not a fan of Sinema’s color scheme here, but maybe I don’t “get” Arizona in the same way I don’t “get” periwinkle princess Susan Collins’s pro-choice Republicanism.
June 24, 2021
Sinema channels her beloved Southwestern sunrise in a neon chunky stripe. Not many people can pull this reverse racerback neckline off, but she’s sliving. Her bold stripes read as 2012 to me, but that wasn’t such a bad year for any of us.
If I were for some reason Arizona’s first female bisexual moderate Democratic senator working on an infrastructure bill (maybe a murder or maybe a fluke of paperwork?), I might have cropped the orange top or tucked it into my A-Line skirt for a cleaner silhouette. But maybe that has more to do with my own thoughts about my body rather than what Sinema is rocking. I like wearing a sumptuous grey sack, safe inside.
June 16, 2021
On this day, Sinema wears a similarly cut top to her June 28 look. It might even be the same orange top, and if so, kudos to an eco-warrior. She pairs the pec-forward tank with a multi-colored pencil skirt adorned with impressionistic flowers, her signature red glasses, crutches, a white plaster cast, and one pointy-toed ballet flat. A bunch of men that I couldn’t pick out of a line-up even though a handful of them are credited by name on Getty Images are respectfully looking forward and not at her.
This look is fine. My favorite part is probably the cast.
June 20, 2021
Sinema shines in a floral little number and, if you zoom in, also a bionic leg. This is not a prosthetic. Trust that I’ve Googled this too while doing my Munchausen research. It’s a special sort of hands-free crutch that lets the wearer scoot along on one leg.
Sinema doesn’t do all that cohesive of a job pairing the metal crutch with yet another floral pattern and nude ballet flat, but perhaps people more Rick Owens in the brain that I am could argue that the interplay of textures and raw materials is a revelation, at least by the low standard of people who work and get dressed in Washington, D.C.
June 8, 2021
Sinema wears Neoprene. It’s beneath me to comment on the fit of another woman’s outfit, but she’s done better. Particularly in the next photo.
February 10, 2021
Sinema’s outfit here slam-dunks it for me on every single level. It’s the defining Sinema look. It’s the outfit that her ghost should wear, god forbid she ever dies of old age or Munchausen in 100 years. She’s doing the goddamn thing. Mixing patterns. A faux fur bomber jacket with an in-your-face message: LOVE love.
Black and white and red all over. Her choice to wear a medical-grade mask over something fashionable is always significant. Inscrutable, like her politics.
January 27, 2021
Sinema is unrecognizable in shearling, a surgical mask, and plain black-framed glasses. But if one were to look closer, she also appears to be wearing dangle earrings in the shape of either black sheep or rain clouds. Both very ModCloth, and both unmistakably Kyrsten.
December 20, 2020
Wig. WIG! Sinema’s wig era was her ascendancy, when a nation turned its lonely grease-marred glasses to her. This era was deeply confusing, and on December 20, 2020 it was pink. A Sinema spokesperson told The Arizona Republic that her $12.99 wigs were a political statement in solidarity with Americans who couldn’t go to hair salons. OK.
With a pink wig, high slit, white gogo boots, and a hand injury: she knows she looks good.
December 16, 2020
This Arizona girl weathers Winter Storm Gail in a cherry red wig (presumably also $12.99), a disposable mask, a color-blocked coat in my least favorite scheme (leave black and red for Gerard Way, love) and a totally bad-ass arm cast.
December 11, 2020
A rare miss for me, Sinema’s most devoted and only fan. Her $12.99 wig washes out her complexion, her dress is dowdy, and she looks weary. The Capitol insurrection hasn’t even happened yet.
September 16, 2020
Sinema opts for a halter dress with a bold abstract pattern, a lavender wig, red glasses, two cell phones, and zero casts or braces. I don’t like this one at all, and it’s not even because I’m jealous of another successful woman with a great head of hair.
July 22, 2020
This look is a genuine banger, almost equivalent in its paradigm-shifting capability to the furry bomber jacket. She looks genuinely cool, not just like a politician from Arizona. Her wig matches dress perfectly, and complements the surgical mask to a T.
June 17, 2020
Sinema wears a film negative of her July 22 outfit. I’m a little confused as to why she has identical outfits in two different colors in a way that twins or close-in-age sisters might wear for a family Christmas card shoot in which everyone ends up crying. I would have at least spaced these looks out a few months.
January 21, 2020
This is the outfit Sinema wore to Trump’s impeachment trial: A furry fuchsia coat, black tights, and butter-yellow booties. Not since Ted Cruz read his children a bedtime story during a 2013 filibuster has something so funny gone down in that chamber.
December 4, 2020
Lot happening sleeve-wise here. This is early enough in her tenure that she was still finding her look.
April 19, 2019
No disrespect to Steny Hoyer in this photo, but is he going in for a goodnight kiss? Can you blame him (you can, of course, and should) when Sinema looks so chic in a fitted bird-and-twig patterned dress with racing strips? Plus an Apple Watch?
May 15, 2019
Sinema’s in her signature look, as American as apple pie and baseball: bold stripes in fuchsia and orange, heavy frames, an Apple Watch, and puff puff dangly earrings.
January 20, 2019
Sinema wears arm warmers, a rare pant, and an even rarer visor. Her half-marathon pinny says SQUAD on it, but the U is somewhat confusingly stylized as a skull and crossbones. This has a real girls rule energy to it.
January 3, 2019
The big one. Almost. At this mock swearing-in ceremony with Mike Pence (Remember that guy? The forgettability of evil...), Sinema sports Shirley Temple-style ringlets, white pointy pumps, a bold floral skirt, and a white silken halter top with a ruched neck. It looks as if Pence likes what he sees, which is why Mother is probably the one taking this photo.
November 12, 2018
Not that anyone’s asking me, but this look is probably the only one of Sinema’s I’d try wearing. She looks good in this. I’d probably be self-conscious of my arms. Any opportunity to put on the furry LOVE love bomber.
November 3, 2018
Sinema incorrectly does the Shaka symbol in butter yellow with flipsy flopsy sleeves. She must not have owned an Apple Watch yet at this point.
March 10, 2018
Sinema looks like the belle of the Human Rights-themed ball on March 10, 2018 in an off-the-shoulder gray gown with evermore abstracted florals. LOVE is love is LOVE is love.
