While still appealing her loss in last year's Arizona gubernatorial race, Kari Lake will mount a new fight—to snag Kyrsten Sinema's Senate seat. The former TV news anchor tells the Wall Street Journal that she'll launch her campaign with a rally on Oct. 10, setting up a likely contest between the Republican, the independent Sinema, and Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego. It's "expected to be one of the closest Senate races in 2024," per the Hill. Lake, who has aligned herself closely with former President Donald Trump and echoed his unfounded allegations of fraud in protesting her 2022 gubernatorial loss, tells the Journal that Arizona needs a senator "who is going to fight back and put America first."
Lake plans to continue to appeal her 2022 election loss while on the campaign trail because "I'm a mom, I can multitask. "A rock star with the Republican base," she's spent the last year traveling the country raising money to fund her lawsuits, touting a book, and acting as "official surrogate for Trump's presidential campaign," per the outlet. Trump appears confident in her chances, with the Journal reporting that he convinced Republican Blake Masters, who ran an unsuccessful campaign against Arizona's Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly last year, to pause his plans to run for the seat Lake desires.
Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb is already running, but most Republicans expect Lake to defeat him for the GOP nomination, even if some doubt her ability to sway suburban Republican and independent voters. In that case, she'd face off against Gallego, a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, who's likely to win the Democratic nomination. "Her extremism should disqualify her from public office—and it will. Again," Gallego spokesperson Hannah Goss says in a statement. Sinema, the independent incumbent, hasn't said whether she'll run, though her team appears to be gearing up for a campaign. Early polling indicates her candidacy "may hurt the Republican candidate more than the Democrat," per the Hill. (More Arizona stories.)
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