One of the worst Republican candidates of 2022 considers a comeback in Arizona

Daily Kos Staff

Thursday January 19, 2023 · 3:13 PM PST

2023/01/19 · 15:13

MESA, ARIZONA - OCTOBER 09: Republican candidate for U.S. Senate Blake Masters speaks at a campaign rally attended by former U.S. President Donald Trump at Legacy Sports USA on October 09, 2022 in Mesa, Arizona. Trump was stumping for Arizona GOP candidates, including gubernatorial nominee Kari Lake, ahead of the midterm election on November 8. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images) — Blake Masters, the GOP's 2022 nominee for Arizona's U.S. Senate seat.

Blake Masters, to the delight of Democrats, tells The Washington Post he’s “seriously” considering running for the Senate seat held by Democrat-turned-independent Kyrsten Sinema just months after he lost Arizona’s other seat to Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly 51-45. Masters, whom the University of Virginia’s J. Miles Coleman aptly said, “comes across as a 4chan guy,” stood out in a year full of awful Republican nominees.

Among many other things, Masters called Ted Kaczynski a "subversive thinker that's underrated" before belatedly acknowledging that it's "probably not great to be talking about the Unabomber while campaigning.” Politico even reported in September that internal GOP polls showed Masters with a worse favorable rating than “Roy Moore’s in 2017 as the Alabama Senate nominee imploded amid reports of past sexual misconduct, including romantic pursuit of minors.”

Masters isn’t the only far-right extremist eyeing this race, as a spokesperson for Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb reaffirms he’ll “make a decision in early 2023.” NBC reported last month that Lamb’s ally, 2022 gubernatorial nominee Kari Lake, was encouraging him to run, though she’s showed interest in getting in herself since then.

Former state Board of Regents member Karrin Taylor Robson, who narrowly lost last year’s primary to Lake, also didn’t rule anything out. She told the Post, “I am keeping my options open and deciding how I can best serve the people of Arizona.”

One of the worst Republican candidates of 2022 considers a comeback in Arizona

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