Arizona Republican candidate for Senate, Kari Lake, is gaining momentum in her campaign and bringing some Democrats to her side.
During a campaign event on Thursday, Lake shredded Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as a danger to border security, and she was joined by a woman who said she was a former Democrat now supporting the Republicans.
Jade Gillon, a former Democrat voter, shared her experience and her reasons for switching to the Republicans when she joined Lake on stage.
“My name is Jade. I am a former Democrat. Unlike Kamala Harris, I’m an actual real-life black woman. I’m a former Democrat who is currently registered Republican,” the former Democrat said. “I’m tired of the Democrats using the generational trauma of my people to garner votes. They invoke fear, they tell me I’m oppressed, they tell me I’m less than, they tell me I’m not good enough, and they tell me that my white brothers and sisters in Christ are my enemy. They are not.”
“The enemy is telling me that, don’t worry that I can’t pay my bills and I’m working six days a week this week and I’m tired. And I went to school and I have a career. I’m doing worse under this administration than in Donald Trump’s administration, but I’m told to be afraid of a man who made my life better?” she said.
“How does that work? Make it make sense,” she said. “During COVID, I knew more of my white guy friends that lost their jobs than me and my black girlfriends. We are the same in this country. All these Americans want the same thing.”
“We want safety. We want prosperity. We want peace. And the Democrats keep going back and look, check it out, right? I honor my ancestors and the people who fought for us to be in this room here today. No one is discounting what my people went through,” the woman said.
“I don’t owe the Democrats anything. They owe me. They’re to serve us. They’re public servants. Stop putting them on a pedestal,” she said.
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Lake secured the Republican nomination for Senate with a resounding victory last week.
And for the first time during the current election cycle, former newscaster and GOP gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake has taken the lead in a survey over her likely Democratic opponent, U.S. Rep. Ruben Gallego conducted in July, before she was the official nominee.
Lake, who ran for governor of Arizona in 2022 with President Trump’s endorsement, is now showing a slight lead over Gallego of two percent, according to an analysis by The Hill. Early polls had favored the Democrat, but Lake has been consistently emphasizing the issue of immigration, attributing the surge of migrants at Arizona’s southern border to Gallego’s support of President Joe Biden’s policies. The strategy appears to resonate with some voters in a state that showed mixed political leanings in recent presidential elections, narrowly swinging from a Trump win in 2016 to a Biden win by a slim margin in 2020.
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In the race for a Senate seat in Arizona, the impact of issues like migration and the high cost of living has significantly influenced voter sentiment, diminishing Gallego’s typical advantage of incumbency. Despite his congressional experience, these pressing local issues have left many Arizonans disillusioned.
Lake, who started her campaign in February, initially lagged about 5 percent behind Gallego in various polls. However, following Biden’s poorly received debate performance, her numbers improved, and the most recent polling data shows Lake leading Gallego 51-49 percent.
“Incumbent first-term independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, initially elected as a Democrat in 2018 by a margin of 2.3% over then-Republican incumbent Sen. Martha McSally, left the Democratic Party in December 2022. She had initially filed paperwork to run for reelection as an independent but announced in March 2024 that she would not seek a second term,” The Hill’s analysis noted.
