Former President Donald Trump took to the rally stage in Phoenix, Arizona, on Saturday with what has now become his predictable diatribe against democracy. He commended the kangaroo audit of the 2020 election results in Maricopa County—a county Trump fairly lost to President Joe Biden—and galvanized the crowd with a pledge to push for partisan reviews of ballots elsewhere. “This is only the beginning of the irregularities,” Trump claimed, calling the Republicans in the Arizona Senate who are pursuing the audit for his benefit “conservative warriors.” They have “created a movement all over the country,” he gushed.
Republicans need a net gain of one seat to regain control of the U.S. Senate, making Arizona a critical battleground state. Three of the four top candidates fighting to take on Democratic Senator Mark Kelly—and competing for Trump’s endorsement—were in attendance at Saturday’s rally. Blake Masters, Mick McGuire, and Jim Lamon helped warm up the crowd by backing Trump and his election lies, along with other recycled GOP talking points, the Arizona Republic reports.
The Senate candidates ranged in how far they were willing to go to support Trump’s false fraud claims and the Maricopa audit he inspired. Meanwhile, Arizona’s attorney general Mark Brnovich, a top Republican Senate challenger who wasn’t in attendance, has been criticized by Trump for a perceived lack of commitment to what Trump calls “the crime of the century.” (Republicans vying to become the state’s next governor have generally seemed more willing to get on the train to Trump’s version of reality.)
All of this speaks to the fine line that Senate Republican hopefuls must walk this primary in order “to win over enough Trump supporters to secure the GOP nomination without alienating the broader coalition needed to win in November 2022,” Roll Call reports, a scenario that political strategist Chuck Coughlin described as a “minefield.” It was not “Trump policies” but “Trump the personality” that lost Arizona, GOP strategist and former state legislator Stan Barnes told the outlet.
Perhaps that’s why the top GOP candidates have largely left Trump’s name out of their early campaign content. “Their launch videos and websites make little to no mention of the former president,” according to Roll Call, which notes that when the candidates have tied themselves to Trump, it’s largely been to his policies, not rhetoric. Take Masters, the U.S. Senate contender in Arizona and financial aide to billionaire Peter Thiel. He noted on his campaign website that “Trump was right to draw attention to bad trade deals.”
The Senate candidates’ dilemma is a political dynamic that rank-and-file Republicans in Congress are also navigating, the New York Times reports. Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina was among the GOP freshmen who rebuked Trump after he encouraged his supporters to storm the U.S. Capitol on January 6. She called for a partywide reckoning in the aftermath of his presidency, suggesting an impending break with her party’s leaders. She has since “swung back into line,” the Times reports, joining her colleagues in displays of loyalty to Trump such as voting to remove Rep. Liz Cheney, one of the party’s most vocal Trump critics, and blocking the creation of an independent commission to investigate the deadly Capitol riot. She has also echoed the right’s obsession with Trump pet topics ranging from critical race theory to Dr. Anthony Fauci.
Notably, Mace has done so while “rarely if ever mentioning [Trump’s] name,” according to the Times, the apparent tact of lower ranks “who have decided it is too perilous to openly challenge him” in a party still kissing his ring. All this backpedaling might not work, however; some in Mace’s district haven’t forgotten about the stance she took during her first weeks in office. “I didn’t like that she back-stabbed Trump,” said Mara Brockbank, a former leader of the Charleston County Republican Party who previously endorsed Mace, per the Times. “We have to realize that she got in because of Trump. Even if you do have something against your leaders, keep them to yourself.”
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