Arizona AG debate gets heated after Dem candidate calls out Trump-backed Republican's past boasts of voter fraud
At Wednesday night's debate for Arizona attorney general, the proceedings were derailed when Republican candidate Abraham Hamadeh — a Trump-supporting election conspiracy theorist who has vowed to prosecute the "crimes" in the widely discredited documentary "2,000 Mules" — was put on the spot about whether he believed the 2020 election was truly stolen.
"'I won't forget about the fraud of 2020 and hold them accountable. Your day of reckoning is coming when I take office in January of 2023,'" said debate moderator Ted Simons, reading off from a previous quote of Hamadeh. "Who will be held accountable and what are you talking about here?"
"All people in Arizona want right now is free, fair and competent elections and you know, the media has shifted the narratives and not enough fraud to overturn the elections," said Hamadeh. "Just the other month, this administration prosecuted, in Yuma County, the mayor for ballot harvesting and there are cases and there's an ongoing investigation still, too, Ted. I'm committed to defending the law. It's an interesting argument you're making because there's an ongoing investigation. When I'm attorney general, of course, I'm a former prosecutor, you prosecute crimes in the past and that's what I'll do."
"Do you think the 2020 election was rigged in Arizona?" said Simons.
"Ted, if you look at what happened, we literally at the time had elected officials changing the rules in the middle of the game," said Hamadeh. "All of us want free, fair and competent elections. We had a federal judge Obama appointed and no authority to extend the voting registration and did by three weeks and slapped down by the Ninth Circuit court."
"The answer is yes, you think it was rigged?" Simons pressed him.
"The media had influence, too, Ted," said Hamadeh.
At this point, Hamadeh's Democratic opponent, Kris Mayes, spoke up.
"It's unbelievable," said Mayes. "Obviously, my opponent is anti-democratic and he just told you that he does not believe that we had a fair and safe election, which we did in 2020. You know, my opponent knows a few things about voter fraud since he admitted to casting his own mother's ballot in the 2000s."
Mayes was referring to a report from last month that revealed Hamadeh once boasted about fraudulently altering his mother's ballot in the 2008 election.
Mayes went on to further slam Hamadeh for his attacks on Arizona's elections.
"We have the safest, more secure elections in America," she charged. "My opponent wouldn't answer your question, Ted. Exactly which election officials will you lock up, Abe? You stood on a stage in Prescott Valley and chanted, "Lock Them Up" ... who are you talking about? Are you talking about Leslie Hoffman, Clint Hickman, Bill Gates, both Republicans? No, no, no. Are you talking about Steven Richer, one of the most successful Republican recorders in Arizona? They ran safe and fair elections, and it's rhetoric like that that is getting our election officials into a situation where they're the subject of intimidation, harassment and even death threats. Ted, I want to tell you something. When I'm AG, we won't put up with that."
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