Rep. Andy Biggs says different ranks of the Arizona GOP are coming together for upcoming election

As the 2024 presidential election quickly approaches, the Arizona GOP's different factions have seemingly been coming together for November to turn the battleground purple state solid red. 

Arizona has long had ties to conservative elected officials, such as former senators Barry Goldwater and John McCain. Former President Ronald Reagan had ties to the Phoenix area and there is also a large group of "MAGA Republicans" in the Grand Canyon state. The first female Justice of the United States Supreme Court, Sandra Day O’Connor, was appointed in 1969 to the Arizona State Senate to fill a vacated seat. She was reelected as a conservative to that position twice, even serving as the first female majority leader in any state senate.  

Historically, different factions of the Arizona GOP have been divided. As far back as 1964, Barry Goldwater introduced a new hawkishness into GOP politics. “Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice, and moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue,” Goldwater said at the 1964 convention. Although LBJ trounced Goldwater in the general election, historians note that "the embers of Goldwater’s political philosophy—championing small government and individual freedoms—would ignite the party's conservative wing for decades to come."

According to Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., they are coming together for the November 2024 election. "I am seeing that closing of ranks coming together," Biggs said on the "Just the News, No Noise" TV show. "You have a few outliers, but those guys have always been the outliers."

Former GOP gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake is running for the U.S. Senate and has recently picked up endorsements from Republicans who didn't support her gubernatorial run in 2022.

"Former Governor Ducey has endorsed Lake and also has endorsed President Trump," Biggs said. "You also have Karrin Taylor Robson, who ran for governor against Kari Lake, and they've apparently had a rapprochement of some kind....at least a detente."

Ducey and Trump have had ups and downs with one another. Following the 2020 election, Trump requested Ducey help him with finding fraud in the election, according to CNN.

Trump also publicly criticized Ducey when the election was certified and the state went to President Joe Biden. This year, Ducey endorsed Trump and Lake, who has also been a frequent critic of Ducey's. 

Robson ran against Lake in the 2022 GOP primary and lost. Lake lost to current Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs, but contested the results in court due to issues with voting machines in Maricopa County. 

Robson earlier this year put out a statement supporting both Trump and Lake in their races. "We must come together as Republicans to save our state and defeat Ruben Gallego and the radical left in November," Robson wrote on the social media platform, X.

"If you're a Republican or right leaning, you know that the Trump ticket and Republican ticket from top to bottom is going to do you right far better than the other side," he said. 

According to the Arizona Republic, Latinos make up about 33% of Arizona's population and Biggs says there are ongoing movements to get Latinos to vote for the GOP. 

"There are movements within the state party and even in the national party to reach out to the Latino voter here in Arizona, and that's really important, because first for many years, the party.....[both]state and national in Arizona have ignored the Latinos because they thought, 'well, we're never going to get their votes,'" Biggs said. 

He added that the GOP platform is appealing to Latino voters. "We're talking about what they care about," Biggs said. "We're talking about border issues. They they don't like to see the border. It impacts them just like it impacts everybody else."

The Arizona Republic published results of a poll among Arizona-based Latinos, showing that more than 80% of Latino voters in Arizona chose fighting against human and drug trafficking as a priority in terms of border protection. Just over half of respondents (51%) prioritized increasing funding for border security.