PEORIA, Ariz. (AP) — Former President Donald Trump and his vice president, Mike Pence, held rival campaign events in Arizona on Friday, turning the governor’s race into a broader referendum on the future of the Republican Party.
Both Trump and Pence spoke of their administration’s accomplishments and bashed President Joe Biden, but neither directly addressed the other or the growing rift between them.
Pence, who this week added his name to a growing list of GOP figures endorsing housing developer Karrin Taylor Robson, offered only an oblique criticism of Republicans still pushing the lie that Trump lost because of fraud .
By electing Robson, Pence said, “you can send a deafening message heard across America that the Republican Party is the party of the future.”
He was later more direct on Twitter: “Some people want this election to be about the past, but elections are always about the future. The Democrats would love nothing more than for the Republicans to take their eyes off the ball and focus on the days gone by.”
Robson says the 2020 election “wasn’t fair”, accusing “liberal judges” of changing the rules at the end of the cycle and the media and big tech of suppressing conservative voices. But he stopped short of saying that Trump lost by fraud.
His main challenger, former TV host Kari Lake, has embraced Trump’s campaign lies along with his combative approach to his political and media enemies.
“No one understands better than Kari how to fight the fake media and the radical left,” Trump said Friday evening during his own rally in Prescott Valley, one of Arizona’s most conservative areas.
Trump took aim at two Arizona Republicans who refused to follow through on his efforts to stay in office after losing to Biden. He said state House Speaker Rusty Bowers, who testified last month before the House committee on Jan. 6, “went against the Republican Party.” He said Gov. Doug Ducey has failed to secure the border with Mexico.
Robson is a lawyer and housing developer who is locking in the support of popular GOP figures increasingly comfortable with breaking with Trump. In addition to Pence, his supporters include former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and term-limited Gov. Doug Ducey, who muted a call from Trump while certifying Democrat Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential victory in Arizona.
Telegenic and already known from her decades anchoring the evening news in Phoenix, Lake has energized Trump’s most ardent supporters in Arizona. But he faces a potentially close contest with Robson, whose large family fortune has allowed him to outspend Lake with early voting underway.
“As governor, I want to bring these America First Trump policies here to Arizona,” Lake said. “We are going to secure this border. We are going to restore honesty and faith in our elections.”
Pence highlighted Lake’s past support of Barack Obama’s presidential campaign and a “he’s not my president” meme the then-host posted as Trump prepared for his 2017 inauguration.
“You need a governor who supports every conservative cause, from Ronald Reagan to Donald Trump,” Pence said of Robson, who served in the Reagan administration and raised money for Trump’s campaign along with the her husband, housing developer Ed Robson, one of Arizona’s wealthiest residents. .
Robson has also given to Democrats.
Robson, Pence and Ducey also discussed border security during a second event in Tucson at the headquarters of the Border Patrol union, which strongly supported Trump but broke with him and backed Robson.
“Securing the border requires two things: resources and willpower,” Robson said. “President Trump and Vice President Pence have already shown that it can be done.”
Trump and Pence have occasionally gone to different parties in this year’s primaries, but this is the first time they will be showing up in the same state on the same day to rally for their preferred candidates. The split-screen moment marks a more contentious phase in their relationship as they both consider running for president in 2024.
It also comes just a day after a Jan. 6 House committee revealed new details about the violent uprising at the U.S. Capitol that ruptured the relationship between the two men. The committee recounted how Trump refused to call off the mob attacking the Capitol while Pence, a few feet from the rioters, was led to safety.
The committee played audio of an unidentified White House security official saying that Pence’s Secret Service agents “began to fear for their own lives” at the Capitol and left messages for their loved ones in case they don’t survive. Shortly thereafter, at 2:24 PM on January 6, 2021, Trump tweeted that Pence did not have the “guts” to block or delay the election results while Congress certified Biden’s victory.
“Mike Pence let me down,” Trump said an unidentified White House staffer told him late in the day on Jan. 6.
Trump did not discuss Pence on Friday night, but rejected earlier testimony from former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson, who said she saw a White House valet cleaning up a mess after an angry Trump break a plate and the remains of his lunch. a wall
“They make me throw away food,” Trump said. “I don’t throw away food in the White House. I don’t throw away food anywhere. I eat the food.”
Trump and Pence will cross paths again next week when the former president returns to the nation’s capital for the first time since leaving the White House.
Arizona’s primary is one of Trump’s last chances to settle scores and install allies to carry states that could prove decisive if he decides to run again in 2024. Trump and Pence also clashed in the gubernatorial primary of Georgia, where the incumbent supported by Pence. Brian Kemp easily defeated former US Senator David Perdue, who had the support of Trump.
Arizona, a longtime Republican stronghold whose shift toward the center accelerated during Trump’s presidency, was Trump’s central push to stay in power despite his loss. Trump pressed state officials to block the certification of Biden’s victory, and when that failed, his allies in Congress objected to counting the state’s 11 electoral votes.
Since the election, Trump supporters have recounted the ballots and analyzed the vote-counting machines to try to prove that something was wrong.
Federal and state election officials and Trump’s own attorney general have said there is no credible evidence the election was tainted. Trump’s fraud allegations were also roundly rejected by the courts, including Trump-appointed judges.
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