Kari Lake aims to win GOP primary for closely watched Arizona Senate race

PHOENIX (AP) — Kari Lake is looking to easily win 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.

In Maricopa County, which includes metro Phoenix and 60% of Arizona’s voters, Republicans will also choose between a slate of incumbents who have stood up to former President Donald Trump’s lies about the 2020 election and challengers who claim it was stolen.

The primary will give insights about where the narrowly divided state is headed going into the final sprint of the 2024 election, when Arizona is central to the fight for control of the White House and Congress.

Gallego is running unopposed in the Democratic primary for Senate.

“Go vote,” Trump urged supporters in a telephone rally with Lake on Monday evening. “She’s fantastic. She will not let us down. Kari Lake, I just think she’s going to be as good as you can get. There’s nobody going to be better.”

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.

<bsp-list-loadmore data-module="" class=«PageListStandardB» data-gtm-region=«RELATED COVERAGE» data-gtm-topic=«No Value» data-show-loadmore=«true»