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Arizona
Senate
| ARIZONA |
Nov. 8,
2022 U.S. Senate |
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Plurality: 125,719 votes (4.89 percentage points) AZ
Secretary of State
Notes: Sen. Mark Kelly (D), elected in a 2020 special election and seeking a full term, defeated venture capitalist Blake Masters (R) and attorney Marc Victor (L). Victor dropped out of the race on Nov. 1 and endorsed Masters, but his name remained on the ballot.* (>) This was expected to be one of the most hotly contested and expensive Senate races of the 2022 cycle, and it lived up to expectations. Masters initially had difficulty gaining traction, and on Sept. 22 Cook Political Report shifted the race from "toss up" to "lean Democrat," but on Oct. 27 it moved the race back to "toss up." Masters, a first-time candidate who is just 36 years old, is a protege of billionaire and PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel; he served as COO of Thiel Capital and president of The Thiel Foundation. In mid-2022 as the campaign was gearing up, Thiel put $10 million into Saving America, a pro-Masters super PAC, and he subsequently invested another $5 million. Masters ran on an America First agenda in the primary, but in the general election, as news organizations reported in late Aug. 2022, his campaign sought to tone down his positions on abortion and Trump's stolen election claims. Victor, who was also the Libertarian nominee for U.S. Senate in 2012, ran as a "live and let live guy (>)." He garnered some buzz in October when a poll by OH Predictive Insights put him at 15%, but most polls showed him in low single digits. Although Victor endorsed Masters on Nov. 1, early voting in Arizona started more than two weeks earlier on Oct. 12; this accounted for his showing of a bit more than 2-percent of the vote. Kelly, Masters and Victor participated in a debate hosted by the Citizens Clean Elections Commission and Arizona PBS on Oct. 6 (>). According to Open Secrets, for the general election, Arizona race was the third most expensive Senate race of the cycle; spending by campaigns and outside groups totaled $203.4 million, $83.0 million by the campaigns and $120.3 million by outside groups (>). The Kelly campaign had a formidable fundraising advantage. As of Oct. 19, it showed $79.4 million raised and $73.5 million spent and cash on hand of $7.3 million compared to $12.0 million raised, $9.4 million spent and cash on hand of $2.6 million for the Masters campaign (>). Outside spending was more evenly balanced. An Oct. 26 tweet by Rob Pyers showed that independent expenditures in this race in the general election totaled $78.6 million (>). During the closing months of the campaign there was a bit of behind-the-scenes drama over the extend to which Peter Thiel or the McConnell-aligned Senate Leadership Fund would support Masters' campaign. On Sept. 20, Axios reported, "The Mitch McConnell-aligned Senate Leadership Fund is canceling $9.6 million in television ads for the Arizona Senate race." However, late in the campaign, the Saving America PAC weighed in with a $3.7 million ad buy supporting Masters, bringing its general election total to $10 million, and Club for Growth launched a $5.5 million ad buy attacking Kelly on inflation. Top spending groups were Senate Majority PAC ($28.6M) and DSCC ($10.6M) on the Democratic side and Saving America PAC ($25.4M), NRSC ($9.9M), Sentinel Action Fund ($8.0M) and Club for Growth Action ($7.9M) on the Republican side. August 2 Republican Primary Kelly was unopposed in the Aug. 2 Democratic primary, but the race on the Republican side was highly competitive. National Republicans had sought to recruit Gov. Doug Ducey, but he ruled out running in a Mar. 3, 2022 email. Solar energy executive Jim Lamon was first to enter the race, on May 3, 2021 (>). Lamon would go on to outspend the other candidates, eventually providing a total of $14 million to his campaign. Attorney General Mark Brnovich, who was elected in 2014 and re-elected in 2018, launched on June 10 (>). Masters entered the race on July 12 (>). Rounding out the field were Mick McGuire, retired adjutant general of the Arizona National Guard and Justin Olson, a member of Arizona Corporation Commission. Former President Trump issued several statements critical of Brnovich but held off on making an endorsement until June 2, 2022 (+), finally throwing his support to Masters. All five candidates participated in a debate on June 23 hosted by FreedomWorks (>). Lamon, Masters and McGuire participated in a debate on July 18 hosted by Newsmax (>). On July 22, Trump rallied with Lake, Blake Masters and others in Paradise Valley (>). Of 813,068 votes tallied, Masters won with 40.24% followed by Lamon (28.10%), Brnovich (17.72%), 8.74% McGuire (8.74%), and Olson (5.16%). By contrast, the unopposed Kelly garnered 589,400 votes. Campaign Managers: Mark Kelly: Emma Brown (Jan. 2021) Arizona Democrats' Coordinated Campaign (Mission for Arizona) director, Jan.-Dec. 2020. Deputy campaign manager on Mark Kelly's U.S. Senate campaign, Jan. 2019-Jan. 2020. Campaign manager on Betsy Dirksen Londrigan for Congress (IL), July-Nov. 2018. Campaign manager on Lindsey Davis Stover for Congress (VA), Jan.-June 2018. Campaign manager on Wendy Gooditis for Delegate (VA), Apr.-Dec. 2017. B.A. in government, English from Colby College, 2016. Blake Masters: Daniel Bell Per Mother Jones "one of Masters' friends from Stanford Law." initial Amalia Halikias B.A. in political science from Yale University, 2015. See also: Lachlann Markay and Jonathan Swan. "Last-minute millions arrive for Arizona's Blake Masters." Axios, Oct. 29, 2022. Alison Steinbach. "Blake Masters, GOP Senate challenger, getting late boost from $3.7 million Super PAC ad buy." Arizona Republic, Oct. 26, 2022. Isaac Stanley-Becker. "Peter Thiel to put more money behind Masters as McConnell group balks." The Washington Post, Oct. 13, 2022. Nick Reynolds. "GOP's Chances at Midterm Victory Threatened by Dark Horse Candidate." Newsweek, Oct. 11, 2022. Dan McLaughlin. "A Dubious Poll in the Arizona Senate Race." National Review, Oct. 11, 2022. Jonathan Swan and Josh Kraushaar. "Scoop: Peter Thiel offers to double down on Arizona Senate race." Axios. Oct. 12, 2022. Josh Kraushaar. "Scoop: McConnell-aligned super PAC pulls out of Arizona." Axios, Sept. 20, 2022. Noah Lanard. "Newly Uncovered Emails Show Blake Masters' Long History of Hating Democracy." Mother Jones, Sept. 7, 2022. Mark Z. Barabak. "Column: In Arizona, fears that yet another flawed candidate may cost GOP control of the Senate." Los Angeles Times, Sept. 1, 2022. Isaac Stanley-Becker, Hannah Knowles and Isaac Arnsdorf. "Peter Thiel rebuffs Mitch McConnell over Senate rescue in Arizona." The Washington Post, Aug. 31, 2022. Andrew Kaczynski and Em Steck. "Republican Senate candidate Blake Masters scrubbed language on campaign website saying the 2020 election was stolen from Trump." CNN, Aug. 29, 2022. Alan Smith and Marc Caputo. "In Arizona, Blake Masters backtracks on abortion and scrubs his campaign website." NBC News, Aug. 25, 2022. Roger Sollenberger. "The Epic Back-Scratching Fest Between a GOP Senate Wannabe and a Trumpy Billionaire." Daily Beast, Apr. 10, 2022. Yvonne Wingett Sanchez and Stacey Barchenger. "'I have the job I want': Arizona Governor Doug Ducey will not run for the US Senate in 2022." Arizona Republic, Mar. 3, 2022. Leah Askarinam and Blake Hounshell. "The Man at the Center of Arizona's Primary." New York Times, Jan. 27, 2022. Alex Isenstadt. "Peter Thiel makes $10M bet on associate in Arizona Senate race." Politico, Apr. 26, 2021. |
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