Arizona Doesn't Need More Like Kyrsten Sinema Or Tom O'Halleran In Office

In Democratic Primaries Is Best To Vote For Democrats

The Arizona seat most likely to flip from red to blue is the first district, entirely in Maricopa County and including Scottsdale, northeast Phoenix, Paradise Valley, Cave Creek, Carefree and Fountain Hills— and lots of desert to the east. After the 2020 redistricting, the partisan lean went from R+13 to R+7. Biden won the district by a point and a half and in 2022, the MAGA incumbent, David Schweikert barely survived a challenge by Kevin Hodge, an under-funded Democrat who had no help from the DCCC. Schweikert scrapped by with less than a one point margin— 0.88%. This cycle there are half a dozen Democrats who jumped in against him, although two of them, Amish Shah and Marlene Woods, are Republicans pretending to be Democrats. Of the 6 candidates, 4 have already raised over a million dollars, (in order of cash on hand) Conor O’Callaghan, Andrei Cherny, Marlene Woods, Amish Shah.

I like it when Republicans leave the GOP and join the Democratic Party. It can be healthy. Elizabeth Warren was once a Republican. But I don’t like when conservative Republicans suddenly morph into conservative Democrats— bring their ideological garbage with them and declare they should be elected into leadership positions. Arizonans probably remember former Congressman Tom O’Halleran, a Republican state legislator (2001-2009) who got into a spat with his GOP colleagues, was defeated by extremist crackpot Steve Pierce and, in 2014 quit the GOP and ran, unsuccessfully, as a conservative independent. The following year, he decided to run for Congress— as a Democrat, albeit a Democrat with lots of GOP beliefs. The DCCC supported him in the primary and then the general election and he won a seat and became one of the leaders of the GOP-lite Blue Dogs. He sucked as a congressman and was eventually defeated by neo-fascist MAGAt Eli Crane.

Hopefully the next story like his story isn’t about to afflict AZ-01, where former Republican stalwart, anti-Obama campaigner and Jan Brewer campaign contributor, self-described homophobe and anti-Choice freak Marlene Woods wants Democrats to vote for her in the July 30 primary. She has high name recognition because she was married to anti-Choice fanatic Grant Woods, the Republican Attorney General. She once wrote that she is more conservative than he is. At age 55, she suddenly decided she’s a Democrat. Aren’t we lucky!

Well, in one way we are, The candidate Blue America endorsed in this race, Conor O’Callaghan, isn’t letting her march into the seat. In the debate last week, Laurie Roberts reported that the two of them led the field. “The question for Democratic primary voters,” she wrote, “is this:  Which one has the best shot at knocking off Schweikert, who in recent years has been hanging on by his fingertips. During Wednesday’s debate, two candidates stood out: Conor O’Callaghan and Marlene Galán-Woods… Of the six, O’Callaghan seems the best placed to go head-to-head with Schweikert on tax policy and economic issues. His eyes likely won’t glaze over when Schweikert hauls out his charts and graphs. He’s also not shy about going for the jugular, an essential trait when running against Schweikert. Just last month, Schweikert’s campaign and campaign allies settled up with his 2022 Republican primary opponent over campaign materials insinuating that the guy was gay. On Wednesday, O’Callaghan was quick to go after Galán-Woods, who like her now-deceased husband, the late former Attorney General Grant Woods, was a longtime Republican who left the party. ‘Ms. Woods has been on the political scene here in Arizona for decades,’ O’Callaghan said. ‘When Planned Parenthood was on under attack in the court system here in the ‘90s where was Ms. Woods speaking out about that? She supported Jan Brewer this millennium. … She was a huge, loud champion for (2012 Republican presidential nominee) Mitt Romney.’”

Wood claimed on TV that she didn’t leave the Republican Party; The Republican Party left her, presumably a defense of her conservatism and a slam at Trump. “My values have never changed,” she said. “What changed was the Republican Party.” OK, Democrats know what those values were while she was voting for both Bushes and every Republican— including psychopath Jan Brewer— right up until the GOP left her in 2018. But none of that makes her a Democrat who should be elected to Congress.

All the conservative Democrats in Arizona who think Kyrsten Sinema is a fine role model has been lining up behind Woods. You can contribute to Conor O’Callaghan’s campaign here.