Ciscomani, Leach Win! Tragedy strikes LD-17 candidate

POLITICAL REPORTING BY SBINSIDER NEWS\ANALYSIS | 11/16/2024

Juan Ciscomani elected in 2022 in CD6, has once again won a very tightly contested race. Winning by about 7K votes, he topped his margin from the 2022 election over the same opponent, Kirsten Engle.

Engle had pounded Ciscomani with advertising that decried his stance on abortion, claiming he wanted to restore the “no exception” abortion law from territorial days. Ciscomani disputed that attack, and ran ads that touted his bi-partisan record in Congress. That theme turned out to be a winner in that CD6 is very closely divided by voter registration.

George Khalaf, President of the well regarded polling and consulting firm Data Orbital, had predicted early in 2024 that the pro-abortion voter had “reached its zenith” in 2022 and he was proven correct. Statewide, those voters did not turn out in higher numbers than in 2022 and the results showed.

Vince Leach Returns to Senate

In LD17 (SaddleBrooke, Ranch and Oro Valley) Vince Leach returned to his former position with a close win over John McClean. Behind for almost a week, Leach pulled ahead with the late ballots. He defeated fellow Republican Justine Wadsack in the primary who had beaten Leach in 2022. The district lines were redrawn in 2022, of which 2/3rds of the voters were new to Leach. Through relentless campaigning he became know to that area, primarily northern Oro Valley and won the primary.

John McClean RIP

Then on Friday, November 15th, tragedy struck when a car driven by a 2 time convicted\charged DUI driver struck McClean’s vehicle on the driver’s side door and killed McClean. Police reports indicated the driver who struck McClean was impaired at the time-at 6AM. The accused drunk driver ran a stoplight. He was booked on suspicion of manslaughter into Pima County jail.

Democrat Kevin Volk LD17 House

The unpredicted outcome in the House was Kevin Volk’s coming in at first place in the overall voting in LD17. Each LD17 district has one Senator and two House members and in the House race the two highest vote getters are elected. The two seats were won in 2020 by Cory McGarr and Rachel Jones. Democrats strategically ran a single candidate in Volk and pounded McGarr as too extreme due to his pro-life positions. Spending over 500K on a job that pays 24K in salary, Volk took the top position with Jones claiming the 2nd position. A few days after the election, McGarr was on the Garret Lewis radio show (790AM Tucson) and claimed that the independent votes broke 91% against him -which he believes is not plausible.

The irony is although Volk did win, he will join a minority in the House because the Republicans strengthened their advantage in both chambers. Governor Hobbs, had raised hundreds of thousands to try and flip one or both chamber and failed miserably. It is likely that in 2026, if a creditable Republican candidate emerges to run along with Jones, Volk will be a one-term legislator with zero to show for the effort.

US SENATE LAKE LOSER

Last and least, Kari Lake, the erstwhile TV anchor, could not convince enough independents to bring her to victory. Too, enough Republicans simply choose not to vote for either Gallegos or her and she lost. Having thrown away the 2022 Governor’s race by telling some Republicans not to vote for her and then running a terrible campaign for Senate, she now says she wants to be Arizona State Chair.

Lake never been a candidate that presented herself as an adherent to bed-rock Republican principles, choosing instead to waste precious campaign time on judicial election disputes which lead nowhere and was not something voters wanted to hear-or cared about. Either she has bad advisors, or the good advice she did get was ignored. That is a combination for losing and SBINSIDER recommends that she retire from public life and let better candidates lead the future.