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One candidate is under investigation by the state attorney general. Another is feuding with a sitting congresswoman over whether he allowed children to be abused at the school he used to run. A third candidate had to apologize for saying that “99 percent” of mass shootings were committed by Democrats.
The controversies already beleaguering several of the candidates have Republicans fearing a damaging primary and another missed opportunity against likely Democratic nominee Tom O’Halleran, a state senator, after failing to beat Kirkpatrick in 2012 and 2014.
Babeu did far worse in another primary poll conducted for a corporate client last month by Brian Murray, a Republican operative and former executive director the Arizona Republican Party. Only 8 percent of voters had a favorable view of Babeu after they were told about his tenure at the DeSisto School and his alleged threat to deport his former Mexican paramour, Murray said; 79 percent had an unfavorable view of him.
Scandals threaten GOP in top target House race
Politico
One candidate is under investigation by the state attorney general. Another is feuding with a sitting congresswoman over whether he allowed children to be abused at the school he used to run. A third candidate had to apologize for saying that “99 percent” of mass shootings were committed by Democrats.
Welcome to the Republican primary in Arizona’s most competitive House race, in a rural, conservative-leaning seat that Democratic Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick is vacating to run for the Senate. Though House Republicans are mostly playing defense this year to protect their historic 247-seat majority, Kirkpatrick’s Senate bid has given the GOP a good opportunity to pick up her district – if the party’s candidates can just get out of its way.
The controversies already beleaguering several of the candidates have Republicans fearing a damaging primary and another missed opportunity against likely Democratic nominee Tom O’Halleran, a state senator, after failing to beat Kirkpatrick in 2012 and 2014.
“It will be a knock-down, drag-out race,” said Chip Scutari, a Republican operative in Arizona who isn’t working for any of the candidates.
Several of best-known candidates so far – including Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu, rancher Gary Kiehne and state House Speaker David Gowan – have blemishes that Democrats and fellow Republicans alike will exploit before the primary. And the Aug. 30 primary date will afford the eventual GOP nominee barely two months to recover before the general election.
The six-candidate field was seen as flawed (and chaotic) enough that a group of local and national Republicans, including Rep. Tom Cole of Oklahoma, encouraged a seventh to join the race: state Sen. Carlyle Begay, a Navajo who just joined the GOP in November.
The most prominent is Babeu, a frequent Fox News guest who appeared in a TV ad with GOP Sen. John McCain back in 2010. Babeu first ran for Congress in a neighboring district four years ago, but dropped out after a former boyfriend alleged that Babeu – who was not publicly out at the time – threatened to have him deported back to Mexico if he revealed their relationship.
Now, Babeu is under fire after a local TV reporter obtained a home video of him describing harsh disciplinary methods used at a Massachusetts boarding school for troubled children that Babeu ran more than a decade ago. State investigators called the methods “overly punitive and dangerous” at the time.
In an interview, Babeu said he “would never allow child abuse or neglect to take place” and criticized the TV station’s reporting. “It’s a drive-by piece that he did,” Babeu said, referring to Dave Biscobing, the lead reporter. “They weren’t interested in the facts.”
He also went after Democratic Rep. Katherine Clark, who handled the case against the school as a state attorney while Babeu was headmaster and who told Biscobing that Babeu had impeded her investigation.
“She completely lied,” Babeu said, calling her comments “slanderous.”
But Clark stuck by her comments in an interview. “The school did nothing but stonewall our effort” while Babeu was in charge, Clark said. “He knew and he condoned in that tape the type of child abuse that occurred at that school,” she added.
Babeu insisted that the unflattering coverage hadn’t hurt him and pointed the big crowds he said he was drawing on the campaign trail. He also cited a new poll of likely primary voters showing him demolishing the rest of the field, with 36 percent support. His closest competitor, Kiehne, trailed with 9 percent support.
“My poll numbers actually went up,” Babeu said.
But the poll was conducted by a GOP operative who’s also working as Babeu’s general consultant. Babeu did far worse in another primary poll conducted for a corporate client last month by Brian Murray, a Republican operative and former executive director the Arizona Republican Party. Only 8 percent of voters had a favorable view of Babeu after they were told about his tenure at the DeSisto School and his alleged threat to deport his former Mexican paramour, Murray said; 79 percent had an unfavorable view of him.
But Gowan has his own problems.
The state House speaker repaid the state more than $12,000 in February following an Arizona Capitol Times investigation into whether he’d abused his state car privileges, including using a vehicles for campaign-related trips. The state attorney general is now investigating Gowan’s use of state cars after Gowan asked him to do so. And Gowan generated fresh controversy on Friday, when he barred reporters from the House floor unless they agreed to background checks – and specifically banned anyone convicted of trespassing in the last five years. Hank Stephenson, the Capitol Times reporter who broke the state car story, pleaded guilty to a trespassing misdemeanor in 2014.
Jim Small, the newspaper’s top editor, called the move “direct retaliation against us and one of our reporters” in an editor’s note for exposing how Gowan used state cars “to crisscross the state and advance his congressional bid.”
Gowan declined to comment.
Voters’ “main concerns are jobs, economic growth, and border security and Speaker Gowan looks forward to hitting the campaign trail to highlight his record on those issues,” Melissa DeLaney, a Gowan campaign spokeswoman, said in a statement.
Meanwhile, Kiehne nearly won the GOP primary when he ran two years ago after pouring hundreds of thousands of dollars into his campaign, which he’s doing again this cycle. But Democratic researchers already have a full file of his intemperate comments, including his remark during his first campaign for the seat in 2014 that Democrats committed “99 percent” of mass shootings, for which he later apologized.
But the other candidates seem to be going after Babeu and Gowan the hardest. “Any other state employee that had misused taxpayer funds and had to repay it I don’t think would be working in the House” anymore, said Ken Bennett, a former Arizona secretary of state who’s also running and could see support from the business community.
“When this comes out, it’s so hideous and distasteful to people, they just can’t stand it,” Rogers said. (Rogers ran for Congress in a nearby district in 2014, when her GOP primary opponent thrashed her for saying she’d like to see Social Security “phased out” – a comment she claims was misinterpreted.)
As the campaign heats up over the summer, though, the candidates may outsource their attacks on each other to third parties. Both Gowan and Rogers have super PACs backing them, and other outside groups have played heavily in the district in the past.
If things get ugly, Scutari said, the late primary won’t give the eventual GOP nominee much time to recover. “If you are a wounded candidate, you really don’t have a lot of time to get your bearings straight,” he said.