KJZZ’s Friday NewsCap revisits some of the biggest stories of the week from Arizona and beyond.
To talk about the presidential and vice presidential candidates campaigning in Arizona this week, the first and only debate between U.S. Senate hopefuls Ruben Gallego and Kari Lake and more are former state lawmaker Regina Cobb and Mike Haener of Lumen Strategies.
Conversation highlights
On Arizona’s swing-state status
MARK BRODIE: So I'm curious where each of you see the presidential race in Arizona right now, obviously early voting started this week, ballots are in mailboxes or on people's kitchen tables or counters.
Mike, the conventional wisdom has been, this is going to be an extremely close race in Arizona again, this time. There have been polls that have shown former president Trump ahead. There have been polls that have shown Vice President Harris ahead. How are you seeing things, you know, this, you know, at this point in the race?
MIKE HAENER: I, I think it is very close. I think the presidential race in the, in the swing states is going to be close. I think we're going to wait a number of days probably before a, a winner is declared. And again, that's just the good or bad of being a swing state.
BRODIE: Do you have a gut feeling right now as to like which, which candidate might have the, the advantage in Arizona?
HAENER: I don't really.
BRODIE: OK, Regina, how do you, do you feel the same way?
REGINA COBB: I, I don't have a gut feeling. I think we're going to be, we are a swing state and, and this is why I think we have so much traffic coming through here right now, is I think they, they know whoever wins this state will probably be the president.
BRODIE: Well, and so it's interesting because Regina, you said that you, you don't think it really matters, for example, if the candidates come. So we've also seen a lot of, you know, spouses and other surrogates come through town. Would you say those matter less than having the actual candidate? Like, is it less impactful for, you know, an actor or the, the wife of Tim Walz, for example, to come to Arizona or you know, even maybe JD Vance to come to Arizona that it is for the top of the ticket to be here?
COBB: I think it needs to be the top of the ticket. I think these surrogates that are coming might pull in a little bit. If somebody really likes a movie star that comes in, they're going to go and listen to it, you know, and, but I don't, I think it needs to be the top of the ticket here.
HAENER: But, but that's where again, we're talking about the margins here. We're talking about a very close race. So if a celebrity comes in and supports your candidate and you love that celebrity and maybe you were undecided, maybe that does tip the balance to you going to vote for that candidate because that celebrity came in.
I think that's why you see the different types of people coming into Arizona and other states because again, it's going to be very close and on the off chance that, that celebrity can move somebody, it's to your advantage.
COBB: Do you think the wives, I don't think necessarily like, you know, having a, somebody's wife come in and, and speak is gonna change the, change the voting.
HAENER: I, I think they, I think they certainly can because, and some of them, some of them aren't wives.
BRODIE: You're talking about the second gentleman, for example, who has been in Arizona, not, you know, not a ton but not infrequently also.
HAENER: Again, this becomes a personal issue for the voter. If, Gov. Walz's wife or, or the second gentleman or, or former president Trump's wife shows up, and that's the person that you admire or that's the person that is going to move you from being undecided or maybe not voting to voting. Then, then that's an important thing for the campaign.
On early voting
BRODIE: So, Regina, I also want to ask you about early voting because of course, last time around former president Trump was very opposed to, for example, mail in voting and drop boxes and to an extent still is. And, you know, we saw Kari Lake this week say she doesn't really love the, you know, mailing in ballots and doesn't really like drop boxes.
Republicans sort of built up early voting over the years in the state and as soon it seems, as soon as President Trump said this isn't any good anymore, they stopped doing it. What are you expecting in terms of the turnout by early ballot versus Election Day voting from Republicans this time around?
COBB: I think you're still going to see a strong push for early voting. I used, I used to vote on the day all the time. Now, I do early voting. I go into a polling place and vote ahead of time. I do it in person.
BRODIE: You don’t do mail?
COBB: So I don't, I don't do mail. I've never done mail. And I always thought it was my patriotic duty to do it on the day of the election. And so for me, I don't, I'm not particularly fond of early voting but my whole family does that. They, they do mail-in ballots and, and I think it, it's everybody's choice as far as what they, what they do as long as we have a safe election.
BRODIE: If you're doing it in person this year, you might want to set aside a couple of hours to be there though because it's a, it's a pretty long ballot.
COBB: I, yeah, I, I usually do it ahead of time. So …
BRODIE: And then you bring it in.
So Mike, are you, do you agree with Regina that, that you're going to see strong early vote, strong mail in ballots, strong early voting, but maybe Democrats still have an early voting advantage as opposed to election day leaning more Republican.
HAENER: I think so. The Trump campaign seems to be a little bit schizophrenic and, and saying that they support early voting and go do that, and then maybe not. So I think there's going to be a little bit of confusion there, but I do think that Democrats will have an edge on early voting.
BRODIE: So when we look at election night, both of you have said we're not going to know, I mean, the conventional was, is we're not going to know the winner on election night. It could be several days before the end. It would seem as though perhaps, you know, the Kamala Harris or Democrats might have that early advantage on election night start to chip away as more of those “late early” people who bring their ballots on Election Day and some of the more the other Election Day ballots are counted. Is that what you're expecting, Regina?
COBB: I am, I am, I expect exactly that. So if you see coming in and they're, they're both even then, Trump will probably go ahead at that point. If she's got a fairly large lead, I, I think you're going to still be waiting until the very end.
BRODIE: Could be, I mean, last time, four years ago, it was still several days until we really, we really knew who won.