Kari Lake Inevitable Republican Nominee
The Arizona gubernatorial loser is back to lose the Senate.
Yet another installment in our America has weak political parties series.
POLITICO (“National Republicans knew Lake was unbeatable. So they joined her.“):
Kari Lake launched her long-awaited Senate campaign with a 50-minute speech on Tuesday that bore little resemblance to the fire and brimstone candidacy that marked her gubernatorial bid two years ago.
Appearing in an airplane hangar in 94-degree heat, the former TV anchor devoted much of her address to lamenting rising inflation, gas prices and the border crisis. The script suggested a candidate keenly invested in trying to tweak her image. It contained just one passing reference to the election fraud claims that she has harped on so much that they came to politically define her.
[…]
Lake’s efforts to recast herself, much like her candidacy as a whole, presents a conundrum for Republicans. Many had hoped that she would leave the political stage after her defeat in 2022, convinced that she blew a winnable race by waging such a vicious, unapologetic campaign that dwelled on conspiracies.
But as Lake began to openly consider a Senate bid, it also became evident that the party had no mechanism or leverage for stopping her even if they wanted to. Party operatives traded around private polling that showed Lake was unbeatable in a primary and that hits against her did not put a dent in her numbers, according to a person familiar with the data.
Those who had run against her in the past said they had no appetite to challenge her again in the present.
“She’s the kind of person that doesn’t just run to win. She runs to destroy,” said former Rep. Matt Salmon (R-Ariz.), who dropped out of the 2022 governor’s race and endorsed the establishment candidate, Karrin Taylor Robson, to try to avoid opening a path to victory for Lake. Robson ended up losing in the primary.
Salmon recalled that Lake once accused him of wanting children with special needs to be sexually assaulted because he didn’t believe in putting cameras in the classroom. “To walk through the kind of sewage that you have to walk through to campaign against Kari Lake — it’s not a pleasant prospect,” he said. Running against her now, he added, would be a “suicide mission.”
[…]
The question is whether she can really move beyond her base in a race that becomes complicated by the possibility of an unprecedented three-way contest. Rep. Ruben Gallego is the likely Democratic nominee, but incumbent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, who switched to an independent, has not revealed whether or not she plans to run again and has until April to file for reelection.
Outwardly, GOP operatives in D.C. and Arizona hope Lake’s recalibration works. Privately, they are not sure. She could easily be lured into discussing a variety of issues that could turn off voters beyond her base. And Democrats plan to attack her on her past statements and current policy proposals.
“I think her ceiling’s in the mid to low 30s. I have a hard time seeing her get 38 percent of the general election in a three-way race,” said Chuck Coughlin, a longtime Arizona operative. Still she could, he said, “If she’s less contemptuous and more aspirational, which I don’t really see her being.”
Others are even less hopeful that a blend of MAGA and mainstream could work.
“I don’t think she has any prospect of actually being elected,” said Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah). “The people of Arizona are smarter than that.”
The fact that awful, unelectable people keep winning Republican primaries for statewide races they’re likely to lose is a function of a rabid base. Still, in a more rational system, national and state parties would have more control over who runs under their banner.
While this is good news for those who want Democrats to win elections, it’s bad news for the country and, certainly, for the vast majority of voters who aren’t involved enough in politics to vote in primaries. Arizona is not a MAGA state but its people have had a MAGA candidate as one of only two choices for governor, and likely for Senator.
While this is certainly a symptom of the weakness of the Republican party, the solution is fairly straightforward: change the primary qualification rules. Republicans (and Democrats) don’t have to go back to smoke filled rooms that pick a candidate, public be damned. But it is entirely reasonable to have a party exert more control over the process of selecting who represents them.
When Trump’s know-nothing, mud-slinging approach succeeded, candidates like Lake and MTG and Lauren Boebert were eager to show that they, too, knew nothing about governing but could own the libs. Once again, the rabid GOP base responded positively and the disease spread. Weak party leadership (looking at YOU, Rona Romney McDaniel) adopted the any publicity is good publicity philosophy and now there is no end to the number of clowns who will tumble out of the car. The only cure will come at the ballot box.
Hard disagree here. With Republicans attempting to destroy democracy itself and rallying behind (of all people) Donald F***ing Trump, the act of wanting Democrats to win elections is good for the country – full stop.
Well, the people are smarter than that, but most of the GOP voters aren’t.
Sure, we could let the voters off the hook for not paying attention before the general election. Or maybe they could do what people who live in overwhelmingly Blue or Red states/municipalities do, and get involved in the primary. I really don’t get this attitude of “those poor poor voters would chose someone else if only they had more choices in the general.” They have choices but it requires them to vote in the primaries and they obviously don’t give enough sh*ts to do that.
If there were ten general candidates, I suspect Alabamians would have still voted for the student athlete’s coach, unless there was another sports figure on the ballot.
Perhaps nice to contemplate but it’s an undemocratic process in the end. Better that the MAGA crazies and the GOP win the political version of the ‘Darwin awards’. And then maybe other groups will form and start fielding ‘electable’ candidates.
Extremism and awfulnews is not just an analomy of “rabid base.”
It’s Republican policies. It’s Republican ideology. It’s most of the party and most of its politicians.
The idea that primaries are the problem and that Republican Party would be much different with more primary participation is wishful thinking.
Actually, voting in primaries is very convenient in AZ, turnout is real heavy compared to most states.
AZ has something called the PEVL, permanent early voting list which is, in effect, a permanent vote by mail list. Mail ballots are sent automatically, every election, to everyone on it.
Of course, as a closed primary state, only people who choose a party when they register get primary ballots. (Or they get primary ballots only for the initiatives, not the party nominations).
@DK:
That idea does not apply to AZ for reasons I just described. Maybe if the AZ primary were open, but the majority, including me, voted down the last attempt at that. (Actually, IIRC, it was an attempt at a “jungle primary” like CA etc. that got voted down).
And, BTW, some elections in AZ, such as my city’s municipal elections, and sometimes bond elections, are conducted by mail exclusively.
Az is not regarded as a vote-by-mail state, but it is not so different from one.
I think it’s a combination of the nature of primaries and of the ideologies embraced by the GOP that keeps driving the GOP, specifically, towards extremism.
Mixing religion with politics or more broadly being ideological about politics. So this happens elsewhere too, not just in the U.S.
Another factor is epistemological sorting on social media, news media etc. with modern communications technology.
@charontwo:
Actually, IIRC, straightforward attempts at moving to open primaries in AZ also get voted down.
Wait – whut? She said she was Governor…how can she run for Senate? Did she resign???
@Tony W:
If party leadership had more control over their candidates, 1) a Jeb Bush or Marco Rubio would have been the 2016 nominee, not Trump and 2) you’d see far fewer lunatics “attempting to destroy democracy” on the ballot for the House, much less the Senate.
@MarkedMan:
So, first, if the primary is essentially the general election (as it was in Alabama when I first started voting) then it’s not really a primary. Second, it’s not at all obvious that having a bunch on low-interest voters show up in the primaries would mean rallying around a great candidate. That’s especially true if it’s just first past the post and there’s not a runoff.
@DK: The party wasn’t regularly nominating lunatics until the Trump era. Indeed, it was essentially never heard of before the Tea Party.
@Argon:
I guess I just don’t see why parties should choose their representatives via democratic methods. I think it is misapplying something that is good in some circumstances to a case where it is actively harmful.
Right now anyone can register as a Republican (or Democrat) and can vote in the primary. And anyone can run as Republican (or Democrat). This renders it impossible for a party to actually stand for anything. There’s a reason the Republicans literally gave up on having a Party Platform in 2020. A real world example of this occurred with Ross Perot’s Reform Party. It raised a whole lot of money (for the time) and perhaps could have eventually become an electoral force. But ol’ Ross insisted that no party bosses would chose the candidate – every Reform Party member could vote for whoever they wanted. Radical at the time, but the norm now. And what happened? The professional campaign advisor establishment got a whiff of all that loot sitting in the Reform Party election fund and they swooped in and ran their own guys in a professional manner, winning the nom. They sucked all the money up without fielding a candidate of any significant appeal, and the Reform Party withered to a shell of its former self.
I guess the Reform Party still exists, but (based on merest speculation) I would imagine its raison d’etre is the same as so many other minor parties (Conservative Party, Right to Life Party, etc) that basically sell their ballot slot to the Republican (or Democrat for minor parties with more liberal sounding names). Basically, they are a honey trap for those who say, “F the Repubs and Dems, I’m voting for someone else!” Every year they negotiate a price and if the Republican campaign officials decide it is worth it, they “endorse” the Republican candidate. If the campaign decides its not going to make a difference, the party runs one of their own, consisting of nothing more than a line on the ballot.
This, as with the abortion “debate,” can be easily settled by not voting for Republican candidates again in your lifetime. Let them remain crazy. This isn’t the fault of the Democrats, and it isn’t the fault of The System in any way.
I have thoughts and prayers for Republican incompetence. Republicans don’t deserve special consideration in any way.
James, I agree that Republican incompetence is bad news for the country. However, it’s on Republicans to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. Nobody’s coming to move the goalposts to help Republicans win again by One Weird Trick.
No more Brooks Brothers riot, no more 1/6.. they have now tried everything outside of campaigning on issues to win.
America has A weak political Party. Republicans have agency and intentionally chose to organize their party in this fashion.
The hot mess currently going by the name of Kari Lake isn’t the fault of the Democrats in any way. The party of personal responsibility needs to fix their own issues.
They’d have to first accept that they have an issue, of course.
… Because they think it’s a good idea. They’re being their true self, and I’m here for it.
Oh sure, blame the black man. 😉 😉
On the more serious side, I think it is quite likely that Obama’s 2 terms followed by HRC’s candidacy drove a lot of Republicans over the edge with their hate for and fear of the other. Hence their embrace of trump. He told them they were right to feel that way.
@James Joyner:
So then I’m not getting your point. Right now the difference between the primary and the general is that in the general we add in all the low interest voters.
@charontwo:
Interesting. Thanks for the education.
She got 49.7% of the vote for governor. That’s a toss up.
With Sinema as an independent, if there’s a Democrat running for the Senate as well, it will be a mess.
This horrible person could very well win.
@MarkedMan:
Not sure about the impossible part. The Democratic Party has a detailed, serious, adult platform — around which its factions are generally united.
We are fond of saying “the system is bad” and “the process is broken” when really we mean “Modern Republicans are bad and broken because they’ve spent the past half century catering to bad people and bad policies.”
It’s just that many former Republicans can’t give up their priors and admit we were wrong. And that the liberals who said we were embracing facism by courting white supremacists, evangelical extremists, and greedy crony capitalists were right.
@MarkedMan:
Agreed. Americans think it is good because a) it sounds good, and b) we’ve done it that way for a long time (and we’re smart, right?).
But in reality, the overwhelming majority of parties worldwide do not pick candidates democratically.
Indeed, the irony remains that our overly democratic process undercuts the quality of representative democracy in the US. Because, as you rightly note:
@DK:
I will continue to note that as guy who studies this stuff, the system is broken. The brokenness of the system is what has allowed the GOP to degenerate in this direction.
It is not so simple as “we had a nice system until the Reps broke it.” I know a lot of readers want it to be that way, but it just isn’t the case.
Inflation seems to be largely over, gas prices are down lately (which may not last as OPEC takes advantage of the Israel situation), and the border crisis seems a) overblown, and b) not Biden’s fault. She’s running on exaggeration and lies, so maybe Lake is a mainstream GOP.
@Gustopher:
Ruben Gallego, currently holding a seat in the US House, is definitely running in the (D) primary. In a recent early three-way poll, he has a pretty substantial lead over both Lake and Sinema. If I recall the numbers correctly, the undecideds would have to break almost completely for Lake for her to catch him. And Sinema was a distant third.
@James Joyner: Those guys are welcome to run as Republicans, but they won’t win. That’s because that is not what a Republican is anymore
We can pretend that this Trump thing is an aberration, an anomaly, but the fact is that more Republicans vote for these clowns than don’t.
Vacation season is over. Gas prices always drop in Fall/Winter. OPEC’s ability to counter that seasonal fact may be limited. Take this with the proverbial ton of salt as I am just a dumbass carpenter.
@Michael Cain: That is my recollection as well.
Clarke’s unnumbered Law: A system can be made foolproof*. It cannot be made proof against malicious manipulation.
*This is not to say all systems are foolproof.
@charontwo:
In the 2022 general election, just under 90% of ballots cast in AZ were mail ballots. Colorado mails ballots to all registered voters, but almost 5% still vote in person for one reason or another (personal preference, same-day registration, etc). I consider AZ a vote-by-mail state in practice if not in statute (yet). It’s a regional thing. CA, CO, HI, NV, OR, UT, and WA are vote by mail. AZ is almost 90% vote by mail. MT is about 75%. In the Census Bureau’s 13-state western region, something over 90% of all ballots cast will be mail ballots next year.
@Michael Cain:
It is hard to change parties and win. She has made herself not D enough for the Ds (if not a traitor) and she is obviously not R enough for the Republicans (and is still one of the enemy).
As such, her only hope was to be popular enough that no D would challenge her, but that was never in the cards.
@Steven L. Taylor:
I will continue to as a American with eyes, ears and lived experience, the Republican Party is broken.
The Democratic Party, operating in the same system, is not.
Do what this information what you will.
@Tony W:
It’s fun to pretend.
@James Joyner:
That’s what I know. The system didn’t change. Republicans did.
Republicans were regularly catering to selfishness, bigotry, extremism, lunacy and long before Trump came along, and they were warned about the looming consequences long before Trump came along.
It was only a matter of time before the inmates took over the asylum.
@Steven L. Taylor:
“Long” is relative here. During my life I feel like primaries have gone from “fig leaf covering back room deal” to “the only way to select a candidate in either major party”. Am I wrong in thinking this primary fixation is new, and that it never existed before in US politics?
@DK:
While I agree with you that the Democratic Party is not broken and that they operate under roughly the same rules as the Repubs, I don’t think it is as clear cut as that.
First, the Dems have only been operating under the same system for one election (Biden/Trump). Before that convention delegates were chosen both by primary and by the superdelegate process , where 15% of nominating convention delegates were chosen by party officials – more than enough to stop a Democratic version of Trump or… (what was the name of that strange Southern Republican who hung around high schools trolling for teenagers?) But good old Bernie put an end to that and now those superdelegates have to vote with the primary results for the first round of voting. Given that the time both parties have operated under the same system is so short, I don’t think we can say anything about how this will play out over time.
Second, the fact that the Republican Party went completely bonkers has pushed any sensible person who wants to get things done either into the Democratic Party or outside of politics altogether. This has been increasingly true for decades now, which means that the makeup of the two parties is very different, making it difficult to compare how they respond. If you went back to a time when the parties were much closer, say 1966 or 1970, and changed both of them to primary-only at the same time, I wouldn’t want to bet on which one would go crazy first.
@MarkedMan: This is a bit overstated. The Democratic Party’s superdelegate rules that were changed after 2016 had only been in place since 1988. One reason the rules were changed is because superdelegates were superfluous: superdelegates had never impacted the primaries. Superdelegates never overturned the winner of pledge delegates, they merely ratifying the pledged delegate count. So they were not necessary.
Even if superdelegates had never existed, Democrats and Republicans would have ended up with the same nominees. The loss of superdelegates is not going to change anything.
@DK: I always viewed superdelegates as the “emergency brake” if someone like trump were to get the nomination.
@DK:
@MarkedMan:
Emergency systems are never needed, until they are.
IMO, what has hurt the GQP, specifically in the Cheeto Benito matter, is they tend to go more for winner-takes-all in awarding delegates, rather than proportionally to the vote received.
I may be wrong about this, but the fact is Benito won few primaries with a majority of the vote. He usually took a plurality, until most other challengers dropped out. So in essence he was a minority GQP nominee of a minority of elegible Republiqan voters.
@Tony W: Indeed! And connecting to Dr. Taylor’s post today, I will agree that while there are probably 2 or more factions within the GOP, the fact that at least 2 of the candidates running against Trump seem to be running as Trump 2.0 (and that Trump and the other two account for 70% or so of the total) causes me to wonder how large any non-Trump factions are.
@Michael Cain: I would be cautious of polling this far out. I hope that polling bears out, but a year is a long time.
@Kathy: He clearly has won the GOP over in the meantime. My pet theory is that he showed them that they don’t have to hide who they are.
@Steven L. Taylor: it may be simply that I’ve never lived with an alternative, but I think primaries make the parties responsive to the voting public (for better and worse).
Without a system that encourages many parties, I fear parties choosing candidates would lead to a pair of corporatist, center-right parties that differ on tie color, abortion, and maybe pot. There’s a pretty firm lock on ballot access, and I doubt the electoral college would ever actually meet and pick a coalition president if no one got a majority.
@MarkedMan:
As with the Electoral College, this was part of the intent. Turns out, neither the EC nor superdelegates have the stomach to go that far in blocking the perceived will of the people.
@Kathy:
The GOP changed it delegate award rules for 2024 because Trump demanded that. It’s now even more slanted to disproportionate awards than ever.
I believe the DNC is unchanged – every state with a primary required to go strictly proportional for candidates who meet a 10% threshhold. (Formula breaks down a bit for states so tiny they have few delegates).
There is a website called “Greensheets” that is a good reference for primary procedure stuff. During election seasons Daily Kos has in the past posted a lot of good reference material.
@DK: This reminds me of a piece of investment advice I heard long ago (don’t recall the source): Invest in companies that any fool can run, because sooner or later a fool will run one of them. The GOP has turned this maxim on its head in terms of elections.