The Republican primary for Arizona governor was won by Kari Lake, a former news presenter who quit her job in journalism and was hailed by former President Trump and his ardent fans.
The GOP establishment elites who supported businesswoman and attorney Karrin Taylor Robson in an effort to steer their party away from the turbulent Trump era were dealt a setback by Lake’s triumph. Putting fabricated allegations of election fraud at the forefront of her campaign, Lake said she would not have validated President Biden’s win in the 2020 election.
“Arizonans who have been forgotten by the establishment just delivered a political earthquake,” Lake said in a statement after the race was called.
Republicans’ nominees, many of whom are close to Trump and contest Biden’s legitimacy as president, are now entering the general election race. The Democratic Secretary of State Katie Hobbs will run against Lake in the November election.
“Democrats or Republicans don’t matter in this governor’s contest. In a statement on Lake’s triumph on Thursday night, Hobbs said: “It’s a choice between sanity and anarchy.
Robson had a sizable lead in early election results that only counted mail-in ballots received prior to Election Day, but that advantage was diminished when votes from polling sites were added to the total. When Maricopa County published the results of the many postal ballots that had been returned at the polls on Tuesday, Lake’s triumph became obvious.
“The voters of Arizona have spoken,” Robson said in a statement conceding to Lake late Thursday. “I accept the results, I trust the process and the people who administer it.”
The former president prevailed in Arizona during a midterm primary season that saw mixed results for Trump’s preferred candidates. Arizona has been crucial to his efforts to rig the 2020 presidential race and call into question Biden’s triumph. Along with Lake, Trump’s choices for the House, U.S. Senate, Arizona’s attorney general, secretary of state, and state legislature all triumphed in their respective GOP primary.
If they prevail in November, Trump’s friends will control how elections are conducted in a vital swing state as he mulls a run for the White House in 2024. The statistics also demonstrate that Trump is still a significant force in the GOP, despite the fact that veteran party stalwarts are becoming more brazen in their attempts to regain control before the 2020 presidential election.
In the last weeks before the race, Robson received support from former vice president Mike Pence, former governors of New Jersey and Arizona, Doug Ducey and Chris Christie.
