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TUCSON, Ariz. — PHOENIX — Kari Lake is looking defeat opponent Sheriff Mark Lamb in the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in Arizona on Tuesday, setting up a fierce battle against Democratic U.S. Rep. Ruben Gallego for a seat that could be crucial to deciding Senate control.
Lake's GOP primary opponent is Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb, who says he is more electable and the best candidate to secure the border. But he has struggled to raise the money needed to make his case to voters. Through the end of June, Lake had raised $10.3 million compared with Lamb's $2 million. The once-crowded field of Republicans looking at the Senate race thinned out when Lake, who built a national profile in Trump's “Make America Great Again” movement in an unsuccessful 2022 bid for Arizona governor, made clear she planned to run for the seat.
She defeated an establishment-backed Republican in the 2022 primary for Arizona governor but narrowly lost the general election. Convinced she had victory in hand after winning the primary, Lake did not move toward the center or work to unify Republicans behind her. Meanwhile, Republican voters in Maricopa County will get their first chance to oust elected officials who did not embrace Trump's and Lake's false claims that the 2020 and 2022 elections were rigged. Recorder Stephen Richer, one of the elected officials responsible for administering elections, has become a pariah on the right for aggressively defending the integrity of elections.
Republicans also have an eclectic group of candidates vying to replace retiring GOP Rep. Debbie Lesko in a safe Republican district. The field includes Blake Masters and Abraham Hamadeh, one-time allies who have turned bitterly on each other since both lost campaigns in 2022. A state lawmaker indicted for his involvement in Trump's fake-elector scheme is also running, along with former Rep.
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