supposedly supporting DEI, offering evidence that she once chaired a DEI committee for a state treasurer’s organiza- tion. Yee, who is Asian American, has denied that while also facing racist attack ads featuring stereotypical Chinese music and fonts. The ads came from a PAC supporting Horne, though Horne denounced them as appealing to “ethnic bias.” Congressional District 1 (GOP) The candidates: Jay Feely, Joseph Chaplik, John Trobough This is a contest between Feely and Chaplik. Feely is the Trump-endorsed former NFL kicker who jumped into the race after getting elbowed out of the race in Congressional District 5, where he actually lives. Chaplik is a former state represen- tative whose views much more closely align with the Trump wing of the party, and he’s bristled at Feely’s perceived front- runner status. Their race — to fill the seat that will be vacated by Schweikert — has gotten testy. Feely has faced accusations that he’s a Republican In Name Only because he’s done things like play golf with Democrats and isn’t as militantly anti-immigrant as Chaplik is. Chaplik has tried to score points against Feely by demonizing his philanthropic work in Haiti, including his efforts to help two young Haitian men build lives in the U.S. after the devastating earthquake in the island nation earlier this century. In the process, Chaplik has gotten pretty racist, playing on the bullshit claim from the 2024 election that Haitian immigrants in Ohio were eating people’s pets. They weren’t. While Chaplik has been on the attack, Feely has struggled to appear more moderate while also toeing the MAGA company line. He’s defended his work in Haiti but stumbled through that defense by suggesting that Haitians might have a good reason to eat pets. (Again, no Haitians were eating pets!) At a televised debate in the race, Feely also promoted the false and racist notion that the country’s affordability crisis is the fault of undocumented immigrants. Multiple studies show that is not the case. This is a seat Democrats have hoped to pick up for the last few cycles. Perhaps Chaplik can knock off Feely, but as the more explicitly MAGA-coded candidate, Chaplik would seem to have a tougher time in the general election. Congressional District 1 (Democrat) The candidates: Marlene Galán-Woods, Amish Shah, Rick McCartney, Jonathan Treble This primary is particularly crowded, and is also a bit of a rehash of the same race two years ago. Both Galán-Woods and Shah ran in 2024 to represent the north Phoenix- Scottsdale district, with Shah winning the nomination by less than 2,000 votes. Galán- Woods finished a close third, roughly two percentage points behind Shah. Ultimately, Shah lost the general election to Schweikert, who held onto his seat by a wider margin than he had two years earlier. Schweikert isn’t running for reelection this time around. (He’s running for governor. We just covered that. Did you forget?) That means Democrats feel it’s even more likely to pick up this seat. Perhaps it’s odd, then, to see them trying the same thing twice, with two of the top three candidates from 2024 making another run. But this time, the momentum seems to be behind Galán-Woods. To the chagrin of Shah, a former state lawmaker and an emergency room physi- cian, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has put its thumb on the scale and thrown a bunch of money behind Galán-Woods, a former TV reporter and the widow of the late Republican attorney general Grant Woods. To counter that support, Shah has promoted himself as the only candidate with legislative experience, pointing to his time as a state representative. However, Shah was viewed with suspi- cion by fellow Democrats during his time in the legislature because he sometimes (they felt) undermined the caucus by working across the aisle. Whoever wins — and it probably won’t be McCartney or Treble, two local busi- nessmen — will probably do so by a narrow margin and with a plurality of votes rather than a majority. Just like two years ago. Congressional District 5 (GOP) The candidates: Mark Lamb, Daniel Keenan This primary race to represent this far East Valley isn’t likely to be all that close. Lamb, the former Pinal County Sheriff, is endorsed by Trump and is by far the favorite. Neither is this race expected to be competitive in the general election — this is the seat Biggs is abandoning to run for governor, and Republicans far outnumber Democrats in the district. Yet, how spicy this primary has been! That’s all thanks to some incisive reporting on Lamb from the Arizona Republic. In a series of articles, the Republic has dug into persistent rumors that Lamb and his wife lived a swinger lifestyle at odds with their family image and their association with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Everyone’s welcome to their kinks, of course, except texts and interviews with people who knew the Lambs revealed that Lamb pushed his friends into sexual encounters with his own wife, sent sexual texts to women and then threatened them with prosecution if they went public and was given cover during the whole saga by the Mormon church. Wow, big sex scandal, huh? But wait, there’s more! The Republic has also revealed that Lamb seems to be spending a bunch of time in Tennessee, where he and his wife are opening a sort of ranch resort. We’re not cartographers, but we can say with at least 90% accuracy that Tennessee is not in Arizona’s 5th Congressional District, raising questions about whether Lamb plans to spend any time among his constituents. Congressional District 4 (Democrat) The candidates: Rep. Greg Stanton (incumbent), Kai Newkirk Stanton, the former Phoenix mayor, probably doesn’t have much to worry about here. He’s out-fundraised Newkirk, his upstart progressive challenger, by a ton. Yet this race has received extra attention thanks to political goings-on elsewhere in the country. After Democratic Socialist Zohran Mamdani won the mayorship in New York City, prognosticators have wondered whether the progressive wing of the Democratic Party might be ready to make some waves. That thesis gained a few more data points after three Mamdani-endorsed far-left candidates won primary races in New York, dethroning longtime incumbents. Will the same happen in Arizona, where Stanton is the lone prominent Democratic incumbent to face a primary challenge? Probably not. Arizona’s 4th Congressional District, which covers parts of Phoenix, Tempe and Mesa, is not New York City. There are almost as many Republicans and Independents in the district as Democrats — though some of those Independents lean left — and Stanton has comfortably won reelection each year with fairly standard Democratic views. To Newkirk, those views are the problem: He thinks Stanton needs to more forcefully fight against Trump and needs to more forcefully and loudly reject support for Israel and its military efforts in Gaza. Whether that message hits home for primary voters remains to be seen. Newkirk, a political organizer who touts his more than 25 arrests for civil disobedi- ence, has been losing some steam lately. Since he entered the fray, an old article has been making the rounds that casts an unflattering light on some of his behavior during organizing efforts back east. That article, from 2019, was taken down some- time prior to Newkirk launching a campaign, but it lives on in the Internet Archive. Newkirk has circulated a letter from its author disavowing the article, but he’s lost support from left-leaning groups nonetheless. Among those to rescind an endorsement was Bobby Nichols, a Democratic Socialists of America-backed candidate who won a spot on the Tempe City Council. (Illustration by Austin Ackert) Andy Biggs amish shah Marlene Galán-Woods Warren Petersen mark lamb Gina Swoboda david schweikert jay feely joseph chaplik Rodney Glassman Let them Fight! from p 11
