| NEWS | They Said What? Four eye-popping moments from Arizona GOP senate debate. BY KATYA SCHWENK nomination in this year’s U.S. Senate race. And if the antics at a GOP debate on A Thursday were any indication, they all want to push the seat far to the right. An older — but energized — crowd of more than 1,000 packed into the Hyatt Regency in downtown Phoenix to attend the recent debate, cheering and heckling their favorites. Incumbent Democrat Mark Kelly is up for reelection this year, and in November will face one of the five candi- dates who took the stage on June 23. When Kelly won his Senate seat in 2020, beating out incumbent Republican Martha McSally, it was the first time Arizona sent two Democrats to the Senate in decades. So this time around, the race is again likely to be extremely competitive. On August 2, the primary election will decide who Kelly’s GOP challenger will be. The GOP candidates are: Mark Brnovich, currently Arizona’s top prose- cutor, who has taken a sharp turn to the right in recent months; Jim Lamon, a wealthy businessman who founded DEPCOM Power, a solar company, and who has poured millions into his own campaign; and Blake Masters, a venture capitalist from Tucson who is backed by former president Donald Trump and bank- rolled by Peter Thiel, the billionaire founder of PayPal. Justin Olson, a former Arizona lawmaker, and Mick McGuire, the former adjutant general of the Arizona National Guard, are also seeking the Republican nomination. The five gathered for the first time at an event hosted by FreedomWorks, a national conservative advocacy group. Here’s a breakdown of the craziest — and most revealing — moments of the debate: 10 Mark Brnovich is heckled by an angry crowd over his failure to prosecute supposed “election fraud” and retorts, “Shut the hell up.” In the months since his campaign launched, Brnovich, currently serving as Arizona’s attorney general, has become a Fox News regular, deployed dog whistles n energy tycoon, a billion- aire-backed populist, and Arizona’s attorney general head the list of candidates vying for the Republican YouTube Jim Lamon at the recent Arizona GOP Senate primary debate. about the border, and generally shifted to the right. He even conducted a months- long probe into the 2020 presidential election in Maricopa County (which turned up little of substance, and which was blasted by the county as inaccurate). Despite all this, Brnovich proved an easy target on Thursday for his opponents onstage. “I believe that the chief law enforcement officer in the state has reasonable suspicion to open a criminal investigation into [the 2020 election],” McGuire said as the conversation turned to election integrity. “There is someone on this stage that can act on that,” McGuire added. Until then, Brnovich could not “expect us to take you seriously.” Others on stage voiced their approval. The crowd heckled Brnovich as he stood to defend himself. “I know people are upset,” he said, after reeling off the various election-related court cases his office has taken on. “But we’re conservatives. The constitution matters.” When this plea didn’t work, he changed his tone: “When the truth hurts, just shut the hell up, all right?” Brnovich’s campaign provided a state- ment to New Times about his performance at the debate that did not touch on the election. “Last night we saw the difference between talk and action,” the statement read, saying that Brnovich had shown his record of “fighting to secure our southern border” and “protecting our children against woke ideology.” Jim Lamon rants about outsourcing manufac- turing to China … despite his plentiful business dealings in China. After discussion of the border, social security, and election issues, the conver- sation turned to China. Asked about whether he would support free trade with the country, Lamon blasted China, alongside the other candidates: “China is the enemy of the United States of America,” he said, saying that in the course of building his massive solar business — which he sold shortly >> p 12 JULY 7TH–JULY 13TH, 2022 PHOENIX NEW TIMES | MUSIC | CAFE | FILM | CULTURE | NIGHT+DAY | FEATURE | NEWS | OPINION | FEEDBACK | CONTENTS | phoenixnewtimes.com
