Alabama native announces candidacy as first Republican in Arizona’s race for U.S. Senate
Energy Executive Jim Lamon’s candidacy marks the first Republican to jump into the race to become Arizona’s next Senator in 2022. He is gearing up to restore the GOP’s Senate majority by defeating incumbent Senator Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), a Democrat and former NASA astronaut. Lamon jumps into the race with a background as the founder and CEO of Scottsdale-based firm DEPCOM Power. Launched in 2013, the company is responsible for the engineering, construction, and operation of one gigawatt (GW) of utility solar plants for companies stretching from Oregon to Mississippi to North Carolina. DEPCOM Power was situated at number five on the 2018 Inc. 5,000 list of fastest-growing private companies and, in December 2018, made the Top 20 Best Places to work in Phoenix list. Raised on a family farm in Alabama, Lamon recounted his early experiences growing up in the state, “Everybody has their responsibilities on a family farm, and I learned a lot about the importance of that kind of regimen,” he says. “My parents came from nothing. Dad grew up with no electricity or indoor plumbing. He then worked three jobs, getting a college education at night, with my mom right there by his side, working herself and raising two kids.” “Our home, as well as those of my aunts and uncles who lived nearby, were built by the families with love and help from all the cousins, uncles, and aunts. There’s a great photo of me at seven years old, up on the roof laying tiles. It’s things you learn early on a farm.” Lamon studied civil engineering and played college football at the University of Alabama under the direction of legendary Coach Paul “Bear” Bryant. Formally ranked by ESPN as America’s greatest college football coach, Coach Bryant’s influence and teachings continue to guide Lamon. Following his time in Alabama, Lamon served as an engineer airborne officer for the U.S. Army, including a deployment in pre-unification Germany. “Serving in Germany during the Cold War showed me that American freedom is so powerful, people would risk their lives to escape communism,” he shares in a campaign announcement video depicting scenes of the historic fall of the Berlin wall, a barrier between the communist East and free West. Lamon has touched on familiar Republican themes as he has publicly criticized the “political and media elites” who he expressed have “the power to divide us and distract us, to amplify the angry, the lies, and suppress the reasonable.” His official campaign website states, “It’s time to end ‘BUSINESS AS USUAL’ in Washington,” with Lamon using his considerable experience in the power industry to drive home a “power to the people” message in his campaign announcement video. Lamon’s campaign will be centered around putting America First, securing the Border, and streamlining the Federal Government.
Trump administration to rescind Obama-era guidance on affirmative action
The Trump administration is rescinding Obama-era guidance that encouraged schools to take a student’s race into account to encourage diversity in admissions, a U.S. official said Tuesday. The shift would give schools and universities the federal government’s blessing to take a race-neutral approach to the students they consider for admission. Such guidance does not have the force of law, but schools could use it to help defend themselves against lawsuits over their admission policies. The action comes amid Supreme Court turnover expected to produce a more critical eye toward schools’ affirmative action policies. The high court’s most recent significant ruling on the subject bolstered colleges’ use of race among many factors in the college admission process. But the opinion’s author, Anthony Kennedy, announced his resignation last week, giving President Donald Trump a chance to replace him with a justice who will be more reliably skeptical of affirmative action. A formal announcement was expected later Tuesday from the Justice and Education departments, according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to speak on the record. The guidance from the Obama administration gave schools a framework for “considering race to further the compelling interests in achieving diversity and avoiding racial isolation.” In a 2011 policy document, the administration said schools have a “compelling interest” in ensuring a diverse student body, and that while race should not be the primary factor in an admission decision, schools could lawfully consider it in the interest of achieving diversity. “Institutions are not required to implement race-neutral approaches if, in their judgment, the approaches would be unworkable,” the guidance said. “In some cases, race-neutral approaches will be unworkable because they will be ineffective to achieve the diversity the institution seeks.” The administration issued a similar guidance document in 2016 aimed at giving schools a framework for “considering race to further the compelling interests in achieving diversity and avoiding racial isolation.” The Obama approach replaced Bush-era policy from a decade earlier that discouraged affirmative action programs and instead encouraged the use of race-neutral alternatives, like percentage plans and economic diversity programs. The Trump administration signaled Tuesday that it planned to reinstate the Bush administration’s philosophy. Civil liberties groups immediately decried the move, saying it went against decades of court rulings that permit colleges and universities to take race into account. “We condemn the Department of Education’s politically motivated attack on affirmative action and deliberate attempt to discourage colleges and universities from pursuing racial diversity at our nation’s colleges and universities,” Kristen Clarke, president and executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, said in a statement. In 2016, the Supreme Court, in an opinion written by Kennedy, granted affirmative action policies a narrow victory by permitting race to be among the factors considered in the college admission process. Kennedy wrote that the University of Texas’ admission plan was in line with past court decisions that allowed for the consideration of race to promote diversity on college campuses. The ruling bitterly disappointed conservatives who thought that Kennedy would be part of a Supreme Court majority to outlaw affirmative action in education. Justice Antonin Scalia died after the court heard arguments in the case but before the decision was handed down. Eight states already prohibit the use of race in public college admissions: Arizona, California, Florida, Michigan, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Oklahoma and Washington. The Wall Street Journal first reported the move. Republished with the permission of the Associated Press.
Donald Trump returns to Arizona – and a chaotic political landscape
Donald Trump was just a few weeks into his candidacy in 2015 when he came to Phoenix for a speech that ended up being a bigger moment in his campaign than most people realized at the time. Trump savaged his critics and the media, vowed to fine Mexico $100,000 for each immigrant entering the country illegally, talked tough on trade, promised to return America to its winning ways and borrowed a line from Richard Nixon in declaring, “The silent majority is back.” The packed crowd ate it up — the raucous enthusiasm an early sign of the overwhelming support among Trump’s base that would help carry him to the presidency. As Trump returns to Arizona Tuesday in need of another big moment, he will find a place where his agenda and unconventional leadership style have consumed the political landscape and elevated the state’s status in the national fight for control of power in Washington in 2018. It was Arizona senator John McCain who cast the vote that derailed Trump’s effort to repeal the health care law. The other Arizona senator, Jeff Flake, has become the poster child for Republicans who buck the president’s agenda and feel his wrath on Twitter. The president is almost certain to back a GOP challenger to Flake in 2018, complicating Republican efforts to maintain control of the Senate. Trump has also revived the immigration debate and infuriated Latinos here with his talk of pardoning former Sheriff Joe Arpaio over his recent conviction for breaking the law with his signature immigration patrols. The controversy over Civil War monuments has even spilled into Arizona, where the governor has faced repeated calls to take down a handful of Confederate memorials in the state. And an overlooked item in Trump’s agenda, school choice, has made education a hot campaign issue in Arizona. With the strong support of Education Secretary Besty DeVos, Arizona passed the nation’s most ambitious expansion of vouchers this year, and public-school advocates recently submitted more than 100,000 signatures in a petition drive to get the law wiped out on the 2018 ballot. If that isn’t enough fuel for a political bonfire, Trump’s visit to Arizona will be his first political event since the race-driven violence in Virginia and his divisive comments in the aftermath of the protests. That created a dilemma for Republicans like Gov. Doug Ducey on whether to take the stage at the Trump rally while running for re-election. Doing so would subject him to attacks from moderates and the left by appearing with the president so soon after Charlottesville and possibly at the same time as the president pardons Arpaio and throws his endorsement behind Flake’s challenger. But avoiding the stage could hurt him with the base. Ducey’s plan is to greet the president on the airport tarmac and skip the rally, saying he wants to oversee the law enforcement response to protests. The governor supported Trump and appeared on stage at one of his rallies last year in Arizona. Trump would be hard-pressed to find a state where his Republican base is as faithful and vocal as in Arizona, which is a big reason why he came to the state seven times during his campaign and refers to the “special place” it holds for him. The fierce, non-conformist political spirit evident at Trump rallies here traces its roots to the frontier days and allows hard-fisted politicians like him and Arpaio to thrive. “The Republican primary base in Arizona is highly partisan, semi-libertarian in the sense that it’s against the swamp,” said longtime Republican political strategist Chuck Coughlin. “We’re the 48th state to join. We’re still acting like a juvenile. We still act like we’re the last one invited to the party which is sort of what Donald Trump is.” The biggest consequence of Trump’s unorthodox governing style may be seen in Flake’s re-election effort. Flake has been outspoken in his criticism of Trump, taking him to task in pointed jabs in a recent book. Trump has been sending out Tweets signaling his support for far-right former state Sen. Kelli Ward, who is running against Flake in the primary. Other Republicans with less baggage than Ward could also enter the race and complicate things further, making it harder for Republicans to keep the seat in the general election. Rep. Kyrsten Sinema is considered the top threat on the Democratic side. “If the president himself is supporting a challenger to Jeff, it’s a serious problem,” said Coughlin, who has been polling voters about the intraparty turmoil that has unsettled the race. Voters like Julie Brown are indicative of the GOP struggle in the Trump administration between the base and establishment. She attended a Trump rally last year and remains steadfast in her support of the president, even after Charlottesville. “He’s not totally polished and everyone tears apart his words, but you’ll never have to guess what he’s thinking and I like that much better than a politician who just gets up there and buoyantly lies and is bought by lobbyists,” Brown said. “He’s just straightforward, and like I said, it rocks the boat but we need it.” Republished with permission of The Associated Press.
Democrats, Hillary Clinton counting on Latinos to win Arizona
Sara Morales became an American citizen in 2010 and has voted in every election since. This year, the Phoenix resident will be casting a ballot for Hillary Clinton, joining the tens of thousands of Latinos who Democrats hope will swing the traditionally conservative state in their direction. The prospect of Arizona voting for a Democrat for president has become more of a possibility as Donald Trump loses support within his party and organizations make a push to get Latinos to vote in a state that has long struggled to get its sizable Hispanic population to the polls. In some ways, Trump and Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio are making the task easier this year. Trump has angered many Latinos by calling Mexicans rapists and vowing to build a border wall and make Mexico pay for it. Arpaio has long been reviled by Latinos over his immigration raids. Activists are going door-to-door and carrying signs in predominantly Hispanic neighborhoods to rally voters on a proposed minimum-wage increase that’s also on the ballot and popular among Latinos. Morales, a custodian at a local school who is originally from Sonora, Mexico, struggled at first to find the right words to express how she feels about Trump. She rolled her eyes. “For me, I don’t think Trump will help anybody,” she said. “He doesn’t have values.” Turning Arizona blue would be a historic feat. The last time Arizona elected a Democrat for president was in 1996, when Bill Clinton won his second term. Before that, Harry S. Truman was the previous Democrat to carry Arizona. President Barack Obama lost Arizona by 9 percentage points and 8.5 points in his two campaigns. Arizona Democratic Party chairwoman Alexis Tamerón said the Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee made a six-figure investment in August. Clinton’s campaign invested $2 million in Arizona in October and dispatched Chelsea Clinton, Sen. Bernie Sanders and first lady Michelle Obama to the state. Sen. Tim Kaine, Clinton’s running mate, will deliver a speech in Phoenix on Thursday entirely in Spanish. He also plans on stumping in Tucson. About two-thirds of registered Latino voters identify as Democrats, according to the Pew Research Center. Obama won 71 percent of the Latino vote in 2012. But turnout has been disappointing for political parties hoping to draw the Latino vote in Arizona because they have been reluctant to register to vote. Only 52 percent of Latinos eligible to vote in Arizona in 2012 actually registered, according to Latino Decisions. Those who were registered showed up in large numbers, with 78 percent of registered Latinos having cast a ballot. In all, 40 percent of eligible Latino voters cast a ballot that year. Advocates hope the tide will turn with a major push to increase Latino voter registration. One Arizona, a coalition of 14 advocacy groups, has been canvassing Latino neighborhoods all year. Spokeswoman Pita Juarez says staffers and volunteers registered 150,000 new voters in the state in the past nine months, doubling its original goal. “These communities, these neighborhoods were not being engaged,” Juarez said. One Arizona formed in 2010 in response to Arpaio’s immigration raids. Many of the organizations involved have been vocal opponents of the sheriff, staging protests outside his office and organizing massive demonstrations. The sheriff is running for a seventh term despite being charged recently with criminal contempt-of-court stemming from his immigration patrols. Juarez said the organization is now going back to canvass those neighborhoods, reminding newly registered voters to show up on Election Day. Former Gov. Jan Brewer, a Trump supporter who signed the landmark immigration crackdown known as SB1070, dismissed the notion of her state voting Democratic, telling the Boston Globe this month: “Nah. They don’t get out and vote. They don’t vote.” She later backtracked, but critics seized on the comments and urged Latinos to prove her wrong. Robert Graham, the chairman of the Arizona Republican Party, said his party, too, has made strides in registering Latinos to vote, putting heavy efforts in Santa Cruz County on the U.S.-Mexico border. Graham said he doubts Clinton will take Arizona. “This cycle could be different and they could turn out and whichever team they turn out for I would say they’re gonna be the benefactors and definitely the victors,” he said. Experts say that if Arizona does go to Clinton, it will not be a sweep down the ballot. Sen. John McCain has a strong lead over his Democratic opponent, Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick. At the same time, two ballot initiatives would legalize recreational marijuana and increase the minimum wage. “I think the voters in Arizona are a lot more liberal than the Legislature. And the image the state has is from some of the things the Legislature has done,” said David Berman, a senior research fellow at the Morrison Institute for Public Policy at Arizona State University. To succeed in Arizona, Clinton and her party will have to overcome voters like Ann Miller. The Scottsdale real estate agent identifies as an independent but registered Republican to vote for Trump in the March primary. She said Trump will broker trade agreements that will benefit the U.S. “If he does a fourth of what he says he will do, we will be in much better shape,” Miller said. Earl Vincent de Berge, director of research for the Behavior Research Center in Arizona, an independent firm, said Arizona is becoming more competitive. He says Arizona voters are more centrist than they are conservative or liberal. “You might not wanna believe it, but things, they are a’ changing,” he said. Republished with permission of the Associated Press.
For Hillary Clinton, struggle to change public perception persists
Hillary Clinton bested Donald Trump in three debates. She leads in many preference polls of the most competitive states. Barring a significant shift in the next two weeks, she is in a strong position to become the first woman elected U.S. president. But Clinton will end the campaign still struggling to change the minds of millions of voters who don’t think well of her, a glaring liability should the Democratic nominee move on to the White House. While many see her as better prepared to be commander in chief than Trump, she is consistently viewed unfavorably by more than half of the country. Most voters also consider her dishonest. Clinton’s advisers have spent months trying to erase that perception. They’ve set up small events where she had more intimate conversations with voters. They’ve tested a seemingly endless stream of messages aimed at assuring the public that the former secretary of state was in the race to do more than fulfill her own political ambitions. As Clinton starts making her closing argument to voters, her team appears to have come to terms that the mission remains unfulfilled. “Honest and trustworthy has become our most talked about metric because it’s not great,” said Jennifer Palmieri, Clinton’s communications director. “But we’ve never thought it’s the metric people make a decision on.” If Clinton wins, that theory may be proven true. Just 36 percent of voters believe Clinton is honest and trustworthy, according to a recent Washington Post/ABC News poll. That’s compared with about 60 percent who believe she has the qualifications and temperament to be commander in chief. The public’s perception of Clinton has bounced up and down throughout her time in public life. Her favorability rating fell below 50 percent at times during her years as first lady, but rose to its high water mark then and while she was as secretary of state under President Barack Obama. Democrats blame some of the current negative personal perceptions of Clinton on the hard-charging tactics she’s used to try to discredit Trump, though they believe her sustained assault on Trump’s character and temperament has been crucial. Party operatives also say Trump’s personal attacks on Clinton have made it all but impossible for more positive messages to break through. He’s called her a “liar,” a “nasty woman” and pledged to put her in jail. “When you’re under relentless assault from a reality TV star, it’s hard to come out of that with anybody feeling good about anyone,” said Bill Burton, a former Obama aide. Still, Clinton’s advisers acknowledge that some of her troubles have been of her own making, including her penchant for privacy. She’s spent nearly the entire campaign struggling to explain why she used a private email server in the basement of her home while she led the State Department. She hid a pneumonia diagnosis this fall from nearly all of her senior staff, then left the public unaware of her condition and whereabouts for 90 minutes after the illness caused her to rush out of a public event in New York. “She is a politician that does not seek to be the center of attention and is inherently more private than most politicians, certainly presidential candidates,” Palmieri said. “That doesn’t always serve you great in a campaign for president.” Clinton frequently shoots down questions about the public’s negative perceptions by saying she’s viewed more positively when she’s doing a job rather than running for one. There’s some evidence to back that up. When she ran for re-election to the Senate from New York in 2006, she won with 67 percent of the vote, a big jump from the 55 percent share from her first race in 2000. Her approval rating when she left the State Department, where her job kept her out of day-to-day politics, sat at an enviable 65 percent, according to the Pew Research Center. But if Clinton is elected president, she won’t have the luxury she had as secretary of state to stay away from the political fray — with Republicans in Washington in the opposition, and possibly Trump, too. The businessman keeps flirting with the idea he could contest the election results if he loses. There are also persistent rumors that, if he loses, he might try to harness the enthusiasm of his millions of supporters into some type of media venture. “The notion that Trump is going to go quietly into the night and wish her Godspeed is highly unlikely,” said David Axelrod, another former Obama adviser. “She’s going to have to contend with that and whatever it is he chooses to make his vehicle.” Clinton has begun acknowledging the challenge that could await her in the White House, if she wins, centering her closing argument to voters on a call for unity after a bitter campaign. “My name may be on the ballot, but the question really is who are we as a country, what are our values, what kind of a future do we want to create together,” she said Friday at a rally in Ohio. Some Democrats see the transition — the two-month-plus stretch between the Nov. 8 election and the Jan. 20 inauguration — as a crucial opportunity for her to signal, if she wins, that a Clinton White House would be different from a Clinton campaign. In a nod to bipartisanship, she could nominate a Republican for her Cabinet. Clinton could start moving on some of her more broadly popular policy proposals as a way of boosting her appeal, assuming no crisis demands immediate action. Still, Axelrod said changing the public’s view of Clinton will be a “long-term project.” “There’s no silver bullet to turn around years of wear and tear on her image,” he said. Republished with permission of the Associated Press.
Venturing to Mexico, Donald Trump defends right to build huge wall
On Mexican soil for the first time as the Republican presidential nominee, a firm but measured Donald Trump defended the right of the United States to build a massive border wall along its southern flank, standing up for the centerpiece of his immigration plan in a country where he is widely despised. Trump, who previously derided Mexico as a source of rapists and criminals, praised Mexicans Wednesday as “amazing people” following a closed-door meeting at the official residence of the country’s president, Enrique Pena Nieto. Trump and the Mexican president, who has compared the New York billionaire to Adolf Hitler, addressed reporters from adjacent lecterns before a Mexican flag. The trip, 10 weeks before America’s presidential Election Day, came just hours before Trump was to deliver a highly anticipated speech in Arizona about illegal immigration. That has been a defining issue of his presidential campaign, but also one on which he’s appeared to waver in recent days With political risks high for both men, Trump stayed on script, declining to repeat his promise to force Mexico to pay for a wall along the border between the two countries when pressed by reporters. While he and Pena Nieto talked about the wall, Trump said they didn’t discuss who would pay for a cost of construction pegged in the billions. “Having a secure border is a sovereign right and mutually beneficial,” Trump said, reading from prepared remarks. “We recognize and respect the right of any country to build a physical barrier or wall on any of its borders to stop the illegal movement of people, drugs and weapons. Cooperation toward achieving this shared objective — and it will be shared — of safety for all citizens is paramount to both the United States and to Mexico.” Trump’s presence on Wednesday, his first meeting with a head of state abroad as a presidential candidate, sparked anger and protests across Mexico’s capital city. Former Mexican President Vicente Fox bluntly told the celebrity businessman that, despite Pena Nieto’s hospitality, he was not welcome. “We don’t like him. We don’t want him. We reject his visit,” Fox said on CNN, calling the trip a “political stunt.” Pena Nieto was less combative as he addressed reporters alongside Trump. He acknowledged the two men had differences and defended the contribution of Mexicans working in the United States, but he described the conversation as “open and constructive.” He and Trump shook hands as the session ended. Pena Nieto’s performance came in for immediate condemnation from his many critics in Mexico. “Pena ended up forgiving Trump when he didn’t even ask for an apology,” said Esteban Illades, the editor of Nexos magazine. “The lowest point of the most painful day in the history of the Mexican presidency.” After saying during his Republican primary campaign he would use a “deportation force” to expel all of the estimated 11 million people living in the United States illegally, Trump suggested last week he could soften that stance. But he still says he plans to build a huge wall — paid for by Mexico — along the two nations’ border. He is under pressure to clarify just where he stands in the Wednesday night speech, which had been rescheduled several times. Trump’s running mate, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, told CBS earlier in the day that Trump would make clear “that there will be no path to legalization, no path to citizenship. People will need to leave the country to be able to obtain legal status or obtain citizenship.” The buildup to the speech was abruptly interrupted Tuesday night by the news that Trump would visit Mexico, accepting on short notice an invitation offered last week by Pena Nieto. The newspaper El Universal wrote in an editorial that Trump “caught Mexican diplomats off guard.” Campaigning in Ohio earlier in the day, Democrat Hillary Clinton jabbed at Trump’s Mexican appearance as she promoted her own experience working with foreign leaders as the nation’s chief diplomat. “People have to get to know that they can count on you, that you won’t say one thing one day and something totally different the next,” she told the American Legion in Cincinnati. “And it certainly takes more than trying to make up for a year of insults and insinuations by dropping in on our neighbors for a few hours and then flying home again.” Trump has promised, if elected, to deport millions of immigrants who are in the United States illegally, force Mexico to pay for the construction of a wall to secure the nearly 2,000-mile border and renegotiate the NAFTA trade agreement to make it more favorable to the United States. Pena Nieto suggested there was room to improve the trade deal, which Trump described as unfair to American workers. The New York businessman promised to promote trade deals that would keep jobs in the Western Hemisphere. Pena Nieto made his invitation to both Trump and Clinton, who met with him in Mexico in 2014. The inclusion of Trump puzzled many in Mexico, who said it wasn’t clear why their own unpopular president would agree to meet with someone so widely disliked in his country. Pena Nieto has been sharply critical of Trump’s immigration policies, particularly the Republican’s plans to build a wall and have Mexico pay for it. In a March interview, he said that “there is no scenario” under which Mexico would do so and compared Trump’s language to that of dictators Hitler and Benito Mussolini. Pena Nieto did not repeat such criticism on Wednesday, but acknowledged Trump’s comments had “hurt and affected Mexicans.” “The Mexicans deserve everyone’s respect,” he said. Republished with permission of The Associated Press.
Robert Bentley testifies before Congress on Alabama prison reforms
Gov. Robert Bentley on Tuesday testified before a U.S. House panel on the topic of recent reforms in the Alabama statehouse designed to limit long prison sentences for nonviolent offenders and increase inmate rehabilitation efforts, to reduce rates of recidivism and the high cost of housing the state’s incarcerated population. In a statement shortly after a hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, Bentley touted Alabama’s reforms as a model for the nation. “Prison reform is an important issue in Alabama,” Bentley said. “Alabama has made significant progress over the last year to improve our criminal justice system, ease some of the challenges in our prison system and maximize the amount of state dollars we spend for the Alabama Department of Corrections. “I believe that our prison reform efforts have created a healthy foundation that can, over time, transform the landscape of the entire criminal justice system for the better.” Alabama, in turn, is following suit on a larger national push for “smart justice,” involving changes to federal sentencing guidelines, a move away from mandatory minimums to give more discretion to judges and focusing on giving former inmates viable alternatives away from criminal activity. Bentley praised congressional leaders for opening its doors to state leaders like him, invoking the old saw about states being the “laboratories of democracy.” “States can be laboratories of changes, creating unique opportunities that can address problems. I believe that Alabama is a national model for prison reform, and it was an honor to share our efforts with Congress,” Bentley said in a prepared statement. The move comes just a day after legislative leaders in Arizona called on Alabama Rep. Mike Jones for counsel on the changes he helped institute along with Sen. Cam Ward during the regular Legislative Session. Jones said on the occasion of his visit to the Grand Canyon state that he, too, hopes Alabama’s recent amendments to its criminal code can help show a way forward for a nation whose prison system is clogged with nonviolent offenders.
