Republicans Are Panicked As Kari Lake Considers Running For Senate - Ring of Fire

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Republicans believe they have a golden opportunity to take back a coveted Senate seat in Arizona, but they are panicked at the thought of Kari Lake running for that seat and handing it right back to the Democrats. Lake is popular enough among the fringe Republicans in the state that she could win a primary, but Republicans don't believe she can pull off a general election victory due to her toxicity. Ring of Fire's Farron Cousins explains what's happening.

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*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.

Republicans in the Senate believe that they have a golden opportunity to retake a Senate seat in the state of Arizona in the 2024 elections. I mean, after all, Kirsten Sinema is no longer a demo, uh, Democrat. She is probably going to be running as an independent. Ruben Gallego is now running as the Democrat in the primary. He will likely win, I hope he does. And then you're probably gonna split the Democratic votes withs running as an independent, or at least split enough to allow the Republican candidate to take that seat, unless of course the Republican on the other side of that ticket happens to be Carrie Lake. And that is why even though Republicans had been optimistic about retaking that Senate seat in AR Arizona, they are now panicking that Carrie Lake could in fact end up as their nominee, which they believe will cost them dearly and stick a Democrat back into the Senate.

Here's what's happening. Carrie Lake has not officially declared that she is running for that Senate seat. I mean, after all, she still harbors these delusions that she's gonna be made the Governor of Arizona, um, eventually, I have to imagine she's gonna move on from that if she wants to run for another office. But in the meantime, she has not yet declared, but there have been rumors swirling for months that she is likely going to run for that seat. The Democrats have, I, as I said, they've now got Kirsten Sinema who could run as an independent that could siphon off just enough Democrat votes to prevent Gallego from winning the seat. Now, he can win a primary, but he probably can't win the seat if enough Democratic votes are siphoned off to go to independent Kirsten Sinema. But at the same time, Sinema has been awfully conservative.

So it's likely that she could also siphon off some conservative votes. And that's where Republicans are scared because they believe that Carrie Lake can easily win a Republican primary. But when it comes to the general, her extreme behavior, her nonstop lies about the election, that could cost her. And you could see more moderate Republicans in the state say, you know what, Kirsten SMAs been pretty conservative. Maybe I'll vote for her instead of Carrie Lake. And then Booms becomes the spoiler for Carrie Lake instead of Ruben Gallego. So it's a pretty interesting little scenario that could play itself out in Arizona. And as it looks right now, it's very likely this could be the scenario that plays itself out. Now, Democrats have more seats that they have to defend in the 2024 Senate races than Republicans do. This past year, it was Republicans defending more than Democrats. You know, every couple years it switches the, the next Senate election, by the way, 2026, it'll be relatively even. That's just the way it works out. It's weird, but that's what it is.

So Democrats have a lot of seats to defend, and with Gallego running as a Democrat, they're gonna have to spend more money on him than they would a Kirsten Sinema. So Arizona, right now, nothing is guaranteed. S could be a spoiler, but she could be a spoiler for either party depending on who wins the Republican primary. And if it's Carrie Lake, that's good for Gallego. If it's anybody else that's good for the Republicans. So even though, you know, we're a year and a half away from it, keep an eye on Arizona. That is a very valuable Senate seat. And it, right now, it's up for grabs, but that race could get very crazy, very quickly.