'I can’t vote for them': AZ Republicans explain why they’re abandoning Trump and Kari Lake

19 October 2024

Arizona's 11 electoral votes may come down to just a few thousand votes across the entire state. But if Vice President Kamala Harris defeats former President Donald Trump in the Grand Canyon State, it could be due to a critical mass of disaffected Republicans.

On Saturday, MSNBC host Ali Velshi interviewed six Arizona voters, which included two Democrats, three Republicans and one independent. When Velshi asked for a show of hands for who was planning on voting for Trump, no one indicated support. But all six raised their hands when Velshi asked who was going to vote for Harris.

Registered Republican Danny Mazza said his top issues in the 2024 election were the economy and democracy. He told Velshi that for him, both Trump and Arizona Republican U.S. Senate nominee Kari Lake crossed the line when denying the results of the 2020 election (Lake also still refuses to acknowledge her loss in Arizona's 2022 gubernatorial race).

"It has become easier and easier to not vote for people who don't stand for normal conservative principles and instead deny election results, and try to justify an attempted coup in our country," Mazza said. "You can't say that January 6th was a loving event where people got together and toured the Capitol. It is not reality. For anyone that that is trying to change history on that, or change the perspective on that in a positive way, put a spin on it in that regard, I can't vote for them. i just can't."

Mazza elaborated that he had no problem putting country over party in the 2024 election. He told Velshi that while he disagreed with the vice president's policies, he nonetheless prioritized having a president who valued the rule of law over Trump, who has called for the "termination" of articles of the U.S. Constitution.

"I think that, as a Republican, things that are important to me, politically or policy-wise I should say, take a second place to holding the country together, honoring our constitution and our democratic institutions that we've had for 200 some odd years, but that are really getting torn," he said.

Bettina Nava is another Arizona Republican who said she was voting for the Democratic ticket in November. She said that her main issues abortion rights and "election denialism." Nava — who worked on Sen. John McCain's (R-Arizona) 2008 campaign for the presidency — said the late senator's influence was still prominent for Republicans in the Grand Canyon State.

"He was a maverick," Nava said of McCain. "And so, there are a lot of us realize that we can contain the multitudes, that it is country over party. We are comfortable with that and that we are allowed to be dynamic and freethinking on a ballot, so we don't have to just simply be a robot and vote for a party that's lost. It's heartbreaking."

As New York magazine reported earlier this week, so-called "McCain Republicans" in the Phoenix suburbs are leaning towards Harris and Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-Arizona), who is running against Lake for Senate. McCain and Trump were frequently at odds with each other during the former president's administration, with Trump criticizing the Arizona senator for being a prisoner of war, and McCain being the deciding vote that doomed Trump's attempted repeal of the Affordable Care Act in the Senate.

Watch Velshi's segment below, or by clicking this link.

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