By Staff Reporter |
Vice President Kamala Harris and her vice-presidential pick, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, will be coming to campaign in Arizona on Friday. Details of their visit are forthcoming.
Harris and Walz will be visiting a little over a week after Trump’s vice presidential pick, Ohio Senator JD Vance, addressed Arizonans in Glendale.
Harris and Walz will come to Phoenix, but details of the exact location and time have not yet been released.
The visit comes shortly after Harris passed over Senator Mark Kelly as her running mate pick. Kelly put his support behind Walz on Tuesday, and disclosed to his supporters that he didn’t believe he would be the pick.
“I never expected to find myself in this position,” said Kelly.
Former Governor Doug Ducey told The New York Post in an interview this week that Harris and the Biden administration have been the worst on handling the border. Ducey served as governor under former Presidents Barack Obama as well as Donald Trump, as well as Biden.
Ducey asserted that Harris had failed on handling the border and ought to answer for it as a presidential candidate; Biden tasked Harris with handling the illegal immigration crisis in the first months of Biden’s term, resulting in the widespread acknowledgment of her being the “border czar.”
“She’s never been to Arizona’s border to this date. And that is an issue that she has failed on,” said Ducey. “This was all avoidable with attention to the border, and this is something that Kamala Harris will have to answer for in this presidential campaign.”
Not all Republican leaders have been so critical of Harris. They are part of an organized Harris campaign effort to win over voters in this swing state, similar to one launched four years ago by the Biden campaign.
Mesa’s registered Republican mayor, John Giles, endorsed Harris in a widely-reported guest column last month with The Arizona Republic. Giles also happens to be Mormon, and reported as part of growing Mormon support for Harris over Trump.
Giles cited Trump’s response to the 2020 election results as his main reason for opposing the Republican nominee. Giles also claimed that Arizona had benefited from Biden administration policies such as massive funding for infrastructure and semiconductor development. Giles also criticized pro-life and pro-gun policies as “far-right” threats to rights and freedoms.
“Trump poses a serious threat to our nation. We can’t have a felon representing us on the national stage, let alone one who would threaten to abandon NATO and ruin our standing abroad,” wrote Giles. “Kamala Harris is the competent, just and fair leader our country deserves. This year too much is at stake to vote Republican at the top of the ticket.”
Giles has endorsed Democrats for several election cycles to date, as Arizona GOP Chairwoman Gina Swoboda later clarified in a response statement.
“The Mayor has been endorsing Democrats for several election cycles now. This isn’t news, and it certainly doesn’t warrant any of our attention,” said Swoboda. “At the AZGOP, we are focused on expanding support and addressing issues that matter most to Arizonans and the American people.”
Giles gave $100 to Lorena Austin in April, the state’s first nonbinary and gender nonconforming elected official who made headlines recently for hosting an all-ages drag show fundraiser.
Giles also joined as the co-chair of the Arizona chapter to a newly-formed Harris campaign advisory committee, “Republicans for Harris,” which held a press conference earlier this week on their goal to “Stop Trump.”
The other co-chair of this “campaign within a campaign” within Arizona is Robin Shaw, a former state representative who served in the 1990s. Shaw also campaigned against Trump in the 2020 election alongside the Lincoln Project as part of the “Republicans for Biden” movement.
One of the most notable members of that 2020 movement for Biden was former Senator Jeff Flake.
Former Scottsdale Mayor Sam Campana was also presented as a member of the Republicans for Harris effort.
The woman who announced the widely-reported Republicans for Harris press conference, Delaney Corcoran, runs the Harris campaign’s Arizona communications (she ran the Biden campaign’s Arizona communications from March until his announcement to drop out last month). Prior to posting up in Arizona, Corcoran was the communications director and spokesperson for Massachusetts’ Secretary of Education.
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