AZ-AG: Donald Trump’s Arizona Big Lie slate grew on Thursday when he endorsed former prosecutor Abe Hamadeh in the six-way August primary to succeed termed-out Attorney General Mark Brnovich, who is seeking Team Red's nod for U.S. Senate. The attorney general, governor, and secretary of state are the only three offices that are involved in certifying the Grand Canyon State’s election results, and as we’ll discuss, Trump is supporting candidates for those two other open seats who also deny that Joe Biden won in 2020.
Hamadeh, for his part, also told the Arizona Republic last month that he didn’t believe Biden had carried the state. “No, the 2020 election was rotten, rigged, and corrupt,” he insisted, continuing, “Never again will we sit by as the media, activist judges, and big tech openly work to rob a sitting president of an election.” The candidate added, “As AG I will prosecute the election fraud of 2020 and secure the 2024 election so when Donald Trump runs and wins again in 2024, everyone will know it’s legitimate.” In a separate appearance with a local tea party group, Hamadeh argued, “I think we need to get tough on crime. Don’t be picking on the little guy—but get tough on serious crime and not go after Kyle Rittenhouse.”
While Trump has taken some big losses in recent primaries, his support for Hamadeh could give him a lift in a crowded contest that has lacked an obvious frontrunner. Hamadeh’s intra-party foes are Tiffany Shedd, who lost a close general election last cycle in the 1st Congressional District against Rep. Tom O'Halleran; Rodney Glassman, a former Democrat who now sports an endorsement from far-right Rep. Paul Gosar; fellow former prosecutor Lacy Cooper; former Arizona Supreme Court Justice Andrew Gould; and manufacturing executive Dawn Grove. The winner will go up against former Arizona Corporation Commission Chair Kris Mayes, who has no Democratic primary opposition.
Trump threw his backing behind Hamadeh months after he endorsed like-minded election deniers for governor and secretary of state, and the former prosecutor very much fits right in with the rest of the slate. Trump’s candidate to replace termed-out GOP Gov. Doug Ducey is Kari Lake, a former local TV anchor turned conservative conspiracy theorist who has called for Arizona to take the legally impossible step of decertifying its 2020 results.
And in the race to succeed Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, who is Team Blue’s frontrunner for governor, Trump is all-in for state Rep. Mark Finchem, a QAnon supporter who led the failed effort to overturn Biden's victory and attended the Jan. 6 rally just ahead of the attack on the Capitol. Lake and Finchem, like Hamadeh, face several opponents in their respective primaries.