Nathan News

PHOENIX — It was a battle over whether Arizona is still the conservative-leaning state of Barry Goldwater and John McCain.

Sen. Mark Kelly took on his Republican challenger, Blake Masters, on Thursday in the first and only debate of the race that will help decide whether Democrats maintain control of the Senate, which they hold by the narrowest of margins. Mr Kelly has repeatedly underscored his image of independence, frequently referring to his disagreements with members of his own party, including President Biden.

The pair, who have spent months tackling issues such as abortion, border security, inflation and election integrity, were also joined by Libertarian candidate Marc Victor, who did not hit double digits in the polls.

The debate did little to cover new ground on the more contentious issues, but the moderator asked pointed and direct questions in an effort to force the candidates to clarify their sometimes obscure positions. Mr Masters tried to straddle the line between his previous hardline stances and his more recently adopted softer tone – but continued to play wide at his base, even if it required a few winks and a nod of head or two.

Abortion becomes a flashpoint.

Abortion rose to the forefront of the minds of many voters in Arizona, not only after the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade in June, but because a state judge revived an 1864 blanket ban on abortions that had lain dormant for decades. Abortions in the state, already on shaky ground, came to an abrupt halt.

So on Thursday, each candidate attempted to portray the other as an abortion extremist. Mr Kelly pointed to statements in which Mr Masters had called abortion “evil”, and said Mr Masters wanted to punish doctors and ban abortions in cases of rape.

Mr Masters said he was proud to call himself one of the most pro-life candidates running for the Senate, and quickly launched a misleading accusation that Mr Kelly supported late-term abortions until the moment from birth. In reality, abortions in late pregnancy are rare and often occur because of a devastating health problem in an otherwise wanted pregnancy.

It’s still 2020 in Arizona.

When asked directly whether Mr Masters believed the 2020 vote had been stolen, he appeared to blink. He spoke of collusion between tech companies, the media and the FBI to suppress negative news about President Biden’s son, Hunter.

“But no vote count, no election results?” asked the moderator, Ted Simons, a host on Arizona’s PBS station.

“Yeah, I haven’t seen any evidence of that,” Mr. Masters replied.

During the Republican primary, Mr. Masters won the endorsement of former President Donald J. Trump and won legions of conservative followers by stoking lies that the 2020 election was stolen and Mr. Trump was the legitimate winner.

But some of that language has been scrubbed from his campaign website since Mr. Masters entered the general election, where such conspiracy theories don’t work as well with independent voters, who either trust the systems of Arizona’s popular mail-in voters either just want to get moving. on.

Mr Kelly said Mr Masters’ peddling of ‘conspiracy theories’ undermined American democracy.

“I’m worried about what’s going to happen here in this election and in 2024,” he said. “We could find ourselves in a situation where the wheels of our democracy come off.”

Both see a crisis on the southern border.

Arizona’s political veterans think inflation and the southern border are Republicans’ two most important issues, and Mr. Masters has hammered in early and often. He painted a Dante-esque picture of the border – beset with cartels, overflowing with fentanyl and wide open for millions of “illegals” to cross.

“Joe Biden and Mark Kelly, they laid out the welcome mat,” Mr. Masters said. “They ceded our southern border. They turned it over to the Mexican drug cartels.

Southern border crossings have reached their highest level in decades as migrants flee gangs and political and economic unrest in Venezuela, Central America and elsewhere. Many of these migrants turn themselves in directly to US authorities to plead their case in immigration court.

Mr Kelly called the border a ‘mess’ of chaos and crisis, but said he had worked to get money for more Border Patrol agents and technology to screen drugs at checkpoints. ‘hall.

Don’t make California my Arizona.

Like other Republicans in the Southwest, Mr. Masters frequently uses California as a kind of foil, casting the state as a substitute for liberalism gone wild. And a reliable way to piss off people in other parts of the West? Bring up the idea that the nation’s most populous state — which experiences near-constant drought — is taking too much water from the Colorado River.

“I’m tired of Senator Kelly acting like the third senator from California,” Mr. Masters said onstage Thursday, echoing a refrain he repeated throughout the campaign. “We need someone in there with sharp elbows who’s going to fight for our water.”

“Why is California even putting its straw in the Colorado River?” he added, arguing that the state should instead rely on desalination and the Pacific Ocean.

The most fundamental implicit attack has not been said: Mr. Masters is the protector of the state; Mr. Kelly is just a Liberal in disguise.

A third candidate for a third of the voters?

The vast majority of voters would struggle to nominate Mr Victor – he has struggled to raise funds or capture media attention. But he held on Thursday night, insisting the host allow him to answer all the same questions as Mr. Kelly and Mr. Masters.

For the most part, Mr. Victor took a predictable approach to libertarian smallpox on both of their homes and portrayed himself as the outsider who would be beholden to neither President Biden nor Mr. Trump. And there might be an audience receptive to that message: About a third of Arizona voters aren’t registered as Republicans or Democrats, and many consider themselves moderate or describe themselves as libertarian-leaning.

Mr. Victor could easily attract enough voters to act as a kind of spoiler for Mr. Masters, denying him just enough votes to push Mr. Kelly over the edge. Indeed, at several points in the debate, Mr. Victor attacked Mr. Masters for dithering on his positions and came to the defense of Mr. Kelly.