Arizona Republic: “Schweikert is an election denier who has enabled, or participated in, the style of politics he claims to despise.”
A new piece from the Arizona Republic rips into increasingly vulnerable Republican David Schweikert, whose unpopular GOP extremism has him “on borrowed time.”
Schweikert’s hypocrisy is on full display. He claims to be less extreme than MAGA Republicans despite “voting not to accept Pennsylvania’s electoral college votes in the 2020 presidential election.” He’s suddenly declining to say whether he would vote for a national abortion ban… despite co-sponsoring a national abortion ban with no exceptions six times.
The article notes that Schweikert’s out-of-touch “politics aren’t popular” in his toss-up Biden-won congressional district.
DCCC Spokesperson Lauryn Fanguen:
“Start the clock: David Schweikert’s luck is officially running out. Between denying his voting record on abortion rights and lying about choosing party loyalty over democracy, Schweikert finds himself trying to have it both ways with voters. Arizonans deserve better than his hypocrisy, and they’ll send him packing this November.”
Schweikert campaigned alongside Trump in early 2020, a time when the former president’s approval ratings were strong. He accepted Trump’s endorsement in 2022 as he fended off a primary challenge. And through reasoning he insists is more sophisticated than many of his more Trump-styled partisans, he has arrived at some of their same conclusions, such as voting not to accept Pennsylvania’s electoral college votes in the 2020 presidential election.
To Democrats the story is simpler: Schweikert is an election denier who has enabled, or participated in, the style of politics he claims to despise.
This year Democrats believe Schweikert may finally be on the ropes. GOP-led abortion restrictions in Arizona are expected to boost Democratic turnout across the board, and Trump’s presence on the ballot could be a liability in Schweikert’s Scottsdale-area district, where Trump-aligned candidates have underperformed.
The GOP since has remade itself in the image of Trump, who swapped the party’s fiscal anxiety for “build a wall” rhetoric that blamed many of the country’s woes on immigration and often made baseless claims about the security of U.S. elections.
Arizona has been an epicenter for the Republican-led efforts to cast doubt on the security of U.S. elections, between the discredited “audit” of Maricopa County ballots performed by Trump allies and the effort to falsely certify that Trump had won the 2020 presidential election in Arizona.
Those politics aren’t popular in Schweikert’s well-to-do district, which encompasses most of northeastern Maricopa County, including wealthy Scottsdale and Paradise Valley.
Still he stuck with most Republicans in voting against certifying Pennsylvania’s votes, arguing there was a procedural issue with the state’s process of referring its electoral college votes.
Where Schweikert feels he’s tried to be “straightforward” on the issue, his Democratic critics see political gymnastics to satisfy the anti-Trump portions of his base without alienating the more Trump-friendly wing of the party.
Likewise for the recent Senate-brokered immigration deal, which other Republicans in Arizona’s delegation spoke out against.
The consensus among Schweikert’s critics is that he’s on borrowed time. The long-serving Schweikert has survived black marks and political headwinds that his detractors each cycle forecast would prove his electoral downfall.
In 2020, Schweikert admitted to 11 violations of House ethics rules, including undisclosed loans and campaign contributions; misuse of campaign funds for personal purposes; improper spending by his office; and an environment where office staffers were pressured to do political work.
Add to that the fact that the GOP’s new Trump-aligned identity is relatively unpopular in Schweikert’s district.
Still Schweikert’s margin of victory has been shrinking. In 2022, he lost by less than a percentage point against Democrat Jevin Hodge, who subsequently was appointed to the Arizona Legislature but resigned after Arizona Republic reporting revealed allegations of sexual misconduct in his past.
