GOP's Blake Masters to face Sen. Mark Kelly in November election for Arizona's U.S. Senate seat
PHOENIX - The stage has been set in the race for Arizona's Senate seat in the November general election.
The Associate Press has projected that Blake Masters will win the Republican Party primary for the seat. He will run against incumbent Mark Kelly, who became Senator after winning an election in 2020 to serve out late Senator John McCain's term.
Following McCain's death in 2018, Martha McSally was appointed to McCain's Senate seat, after she lost to Sen. Kyrsten Sinema in that year's election for another Senate seat. She later lost to Kelly in the November 2020 election.
Kelly ran unopposed in the Democratic Party primary for his Senate seat. Meanwhile, Marc Victor also ran unopposed in the Libertarian Party's primary for the seat.
Read More: 2022 Primary Election: Here's a list of candidates in uncontested Arizona races
More results: https://www.fox10phoenix.com/elections
Blake Masters projected to win GOP nomination for Arizona Senate
The Associated Press has projected that Trump-endorsed Blake Masters has been declared the winner in the Republican primary for U.S. Senate. He will face off against incumbent Democrat Mark Kelly, who ran unopposed. FOX 10's Linda Williams reports.
Seven candidates vied for GOP Senate nomination
There were seven candidates who vied for the Republican Party nomination for Kelly's Senate seat, including two write-in candidates.
Of the seven candidates, Masters, 35, received the backing of former President Donald Trump. Masters is a first-time candidate who has spent most of his career working for billionaire Peter Thiel, who is bankrolling his campaign.
Until Trump’s endorsement, the race had no clear front-runner between Masters, businessman Jim Lamon and Attorney General Mark Brnovich, all of whom jockeyed for his support.
Lamon says Trump made a mistake in endorsing Masters and is digging into his own fortune to highlight Masters’ ties to technology firms and his writings as a college student supporting open borders. Lamon signed a certificate falsely stating that Trump had won Arizona in 2020 and that he was one of the state’s "duly elected and qualified" electors.
Trump soured on Brnovich and may have torpedoed his campaign when the attorney general’s election fraud investigation failed to produce criminal charges against election officials.
In March, the Associated Press reported that Kelly's reelection race could be pivotal to the GOP's hope of winning a majority in the U.S. Senate.
Latest Primary Election Results
The Associated Press (AP) contributed to this report.
2022 Election: GOP Senate Hopeful Blake Masters addresses supporters
Masters is one of a number of candidates in the GOP primary for this year's U.S. Senate election. No news agencies have made a projection on the Arizona Republican Party Senatorial Primary, as of 11:20 p.m. on Aug. 2. Whoever wins the GOP primary will face incumbent Democratic Senator Mark Kelly in November. Kelly ran unopposed in the Democratic Party Senatorial Primary.