13 Dec 7th–Dec 13th, 2023 phoenixnewtimes.com phoenix new Times | NEWS | FEATURE | FOOD & DRINK | ARTS & CULTURE | MUSIC | CONCERTS | CANNABIS | A fter Rep. Debbie Lesko announced she won’t run for reelection, a power vacuum opened for the Republican’s northwest Valley seat in the U.S. House, sucking in desperate, disgruntled and even disgraced Republicans from around Arizona. How disgraced? Former Rep. Trent Franks has joined the race for Arizona’s 8th Congressional District. He once repre- sented the seat but resigned in 2017 after reports surfaced of him repeatedly asking two female staffers to have his children as surrogate mothers. How desperate? Blake Masters and Abe Hamadeh — the defeated MAGA candidates in the 2022 U.S. Senate and Arizona attorney general races, respectively — are in, too. How disgruntled? Even Jacob Chansley, popularly known as the QAnon Shaman who stormed the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection, is out of prison and in the race, though he’s running as a Libertarian. At least five notable candidates have entered the Republican primary, which will take place on Aug. 6. With the seat in a relatively safe Republican district, the primary is shaping up to be a competition of whose campaign rhetoric can be the most extreme. “In order to win a Republican primary, you just say a bunch of shit you don’t believe,” political consultant Chuck Coughlin said. “Twenty percent of Republican voters turn out in the primary. “That’s the problem,” he added. Coughlin was one of Arizona’s fore- most Republican political consultants until 2017, when he left the party after former President Donald Trump dispar- aged then-Sen. John McCain as the party moved to the extreme right. Now, Coughlin is leading Make Elections Fair AZ, a bipartisan group working to pass a ballot initiative that would make Arizona an open primary state. “Anything’s better than what we have right now,” Coughlin said, adding that in an open primary, candidates would be less likely to win on extreme stances before moving to the general election. Both Coughlin and Republican political consultant Marcus Dell’Artino said the key issues for voters in the District 8 race are going to be immigration, the economy and inflation. But a huge factor could be a candidate’s subservience and connection to Trump, whose grip on the Republican base has remained constant even as he faces four indictments. Dell’Artino worked on both of McCain’s presidential campaigns. He now is focused on lobbying, government relations and ballot initiatives at FirstStrategic Communications and Public Affairs. “The big question on everyone’s mind is: Does Donald Trump make an endorse- ment?” Dell’Artino said. “You’re courting an older population of voters that voted overwhelmingly for Trump.” District 8 covers Sun City, Sun City West, large swaths of Glendale and Peoria, portions of Phoenix and a chunk of land north of the Valley following Interstate 17 and nearly reaching Black Canyon City. “Your highest turnout voters are probably going to come from Sun City and Sun City West,” Dell’Artino said. The population of the northwest Valley has grown substan- tially since the coro- navirus pandemic, a factor that Democratic political consultant Stacy Pearson said will impact the >> p 14 CIRCUS CLOWNS Extremists crowd the race for a U.S. House seat in the Valley. By TJ L'Heureux Clockwise from left: Abe Hamadeh, Blake Masters, Rollie Stevens, Trent Franks, Anthony Kern, Ben Toma, Jacob Chansley and Debbie Lesko. (Illustration by Ward Sutton) Illustration by Emma Randall
