TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) — Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey has already helped block one of former President Donald Trump’s allies from winning the Republican nomination for governor in a crucial battleground state. Now he’s hoping for a repeat in his own backyard.
Ducey is part of a burgeoning effort among establishment Republicans to field little-known real estate developer Karyn Taylor Robeson against Trump-backed former TV news anchor Carrie Lake. Other prominent Republicans, including former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, have also rallied behind Robeson in recent days.
The push is a reminder of how many top Republicans have rallied around Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp in the latest stretch of his ultimately successful bid to fend off a Trump-backed primary challenger.
Few states have been as central to Trump’s election lies as Georgia and Arizona, the two closest battlegrounds in 2020, where he aggressively pushed to overturn the results and grew angry when Kemp and Ducey refused to comply. Trump has already faced a setback in Georgia, and the Aug. 2 race in Arizona is among his last opportunities to settle scores and appoint allies to run the states, which could prove crucial if he decides to run again in 2024 .
“In Arizona, people are independent-minded, similar to Georgia, and they elect the person they think will be the best fit for the responsibility,” Ducey told The Associated Press. “In Georgia the voters said Brian Kemp and I hope in Arizona they will say Karen Taylor Robeson.”
As an incumbent seeking re-election, Kemp had an advantage over his primary rival, David Perdue, and ended up defeating him by nearly 52 percentage points. With no incumbent on the ballot — Ducey faces term limits — the GOP race in Arizona is likely to be much closer.
But what once looked like an insurmountable lead for Lake could have ended in a more competitive finish. With early voting now underway, Robeson is drawing on his family’s vast wealth to oust Lake, who, despite Trump’s endorsement, has trailed in fundraising. Robson had outspent Lake by more than 5 to 1 by the end of June.
The latest maneuvering by some top GOP figures could prove significant in a close race. In addition to Ducey and Christie, Robeson received support from former U.S. Rep. Matt Salmon, who dropped out of the gubernatorial race and endorsed her. Meanwhile, the Border Patrol union broke with Trump and backed Robeson, citing in part Lake’s previous statements supporting a path to citizenship for people living in the country illegally.
Former Vice President Mike Pence, who notably split with Trump in Georgia and campaigned alongside Kemp, has yet to pick a side in Arizona.
For his part, Lake is an unlikely MAGA champion.
A famous former local news anchor who donated to Barack Obama and spent years hanging out with drag queens at a gay bar near the TV station, Lake was once the antithesis of Trump’s politics.
Yet she has shot to the top of the field since she retired from a three-decade television career, declared that “journalism is dead” and hammered a pile of TVs.
She built on the powerful relationship she had built with viewers in the Phoenix media market over 27 years with the local Fox affiliate, and forged a uniquely strong bond with the base that launched Trump into the White House in 2016 and still hasn’t believes that he lost in 2020
Even Trump seemed impressed by the standing ovation her name drew when he mentioned it at a rally in Phoenix last year. He supported her a little later.
She, in turn, has adopted his combative style, his narrative about the 2020 elections — she falsely says they are corrupt and stolen — and his tough approach to border security. She has distanced herself from her close ties to John McCain’s family and is now feuding with the late US senator’s children.
“Either we’re going to go the way of the past, which is the McCain mob running the show, or we’re going to go with America first,” Lake told a crowd of hundreds at a country western bar in Tucson last week. Many arrived more than an hour early and waited in the southern Arizona heat for a chance to get inside.
Lake, 52, routinely berates journalists who try to question her and releases the footage on social media.
Last year, she said she wanted to put cameras in classrooms to monitor teachers, a nod to the backlash against the right to teach race and history in public schools.
If elected, she says she would immediately invoke an untested legal theory that illegal immigration constitutes an “invasion” of the United States and give the governor military powers to remove people from the country without due process in immigration courts.
Since Robson and her allies began their court press, Lake has claimed without evidence that “they may be trying to set the stage for another heist.”
“They’ve been such RINOs for so long and I don’t believe they have our country as a priority,” said Rosa Alfonso, a 60-year-old speech therapist in Tucson. “It’s a big deal.”
Robeson, 57, is running for office for the first time, despite being associated with Republican Party politics all her life. His father and brother held elected office as Republicans.
An attorney for real estate developers, she is at the center of the suburban sprawl that fueled the Phoenix area’s incredible growth. Ducey appointed her to the board that oversees Arizona’s three public universities, her highest public role before leaving to run for governor.
“These are serious times,” Robson said during a recent debate. “We need a serious candidate with a track record.”
Her husband, housing developer Ed Robeson, 91, is one of the state’s wealthiest residents, having amassed a fortune building master-planned retirement communities. She says the 2020 election was “unfair,” but stopped short of calling it fraudulent. Like Lake, she runs like a border hawk.
She calls her rival “Fake Lake,” highlighting a $350 donation she made to the Obama campaign in 2008, even though Robeson herself has donated large sums to Democrats.
“It’s all a game,” Ducey said of Lake. “The campaign she’s running bears no resemblance to the life she’s lived for the past three decades, nor the interactions she’s had with me. She’s putting on a show. We’ll see how many people buy it.”
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