Thread: Pearce falls in GOP senate bid

By Associated Press
Originally published: Aug 29, 2012 - 6:46 am

PHOENIX -- A former Arizona legislator known nationally for championing recent laws against illegal immigration has lost his bid at a political comeback.

Former state Senate President Russell Pearce lost the GOP primary Tuesday night to businessman Bob Worsley in their race for the Republican Senate nomination in Mesa.

A year after passage of SB1070, Pearce lost a 2011 recall election largely focused on the illegal immigration issue.

Pearce falls in GOP senate bid - Phoenix News - KTAR.com

Wow! That is sad, but what is more sad is that I did not even know that Russell Pearce was running as a candidate or on a ballot tonight! What was this? Some kind of stealth campaign. Our activists are all over this kind of thing.

Was the Russell Pearce in silent running mode, avoiding ALIPAC, or did our activists miss the beat?

Did any of yall know Russell Pearce was on the ballot in AZ tonight?

W

Originally Posted by ALIPAC

Did any of yall know Russell Pearce was on the ballot in AZ tonight?

W

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I missed it. Fortunately though, the most important element of AZ SB1070 was passed into law and approved by the USSC.

Originally Posted by HAPPY2BME

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I missed it. Fortunately though, the most important element of AZ SB1070 was passed into law and approved by the USSC.

Yea, but what kind of campaign was Pearce running for our top activists in charge of the worlds largest collection of information on the topic of illegal immigration at alipac.us not to even know he was running?

W

Bill - I agree. I am an AZ activist, on his mailing list, and barely got anything. It was a terrible effort, but I think I know why: The LDS (Mormon church) in Arizona has wanted him gone since SB1070 became law. They have made a huge shift in favor of illegal alien amnesty and "guest worker" programs. They ran two RINO, open-borders candidates - in the recall and here - to oppose Pearce, and outspent him 2:1 each time. The LDS really needs to be boycotted across America until they stop their disgraceful amnesty push. Please do me a favor and put your considerable knowledge and experience to work and look into it for us. Thanks.

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http://www.alipac.us/f12/jeff-flake-...mentum-263293/

This may explain it (admittedly from a left wing site):


Russell Pearce’s disastrous Arizona campaign is over | TPMMuckraker

TPMMuckraker

Russell Pearce’s Disastrous Arizona Campaign Is Over

Russell Pearce speaks in front of the Supreme Court in Washington, D.C. on April 25, 2012.

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Nick R. Martin August 29, 2012, 2:07 PM 8659 Immigration hardliner Russell Pearce’s burning desire to return to office in Arizona got doused with cold water on Tuesday night when he lost the Republican primary for state Senate to a moderate businessman who took a softer tone on immigration.
It was the second time in less than a year that Pearce, a tea party favorite who was once one of the most powerful politicians in Arizona, was put to bed by a moderate and it marked the end of a disastrous attempt to regain his standing in state politics.
His campaign was marred by typos, fundraising problems, an uproar that involved him questioning the bravery of the Colorado massacre victims and a murder-suicide carried out by a former friend.
When the voting was done, Bob Worsley, the wealthy founder of the in-flight shopping company SkyMall, was on top 56 percent to 44 percent, and journalists were being kicked out of Pearce’s election night party in Mesa, Ariz.
“This is the same Russell Pearce who said he’d never lose a primary,” political organizer Randy Parraz told the Arizona Republic on Tuesday. “He misjudged the fact that he was no longer a conservative Republican — he was an extreme tea party Republican. There’s no comeback for Russell Pearce — he’s done.”
Parraz organized a successful recall of Pearce in November. At the time, Pearce was the state Senate president and arguably a more powerful politician than even Gov. Jan Brewer (R). But fueled by anger over some of Pearce’s more outrageous actions, voters threw him out midway through his term in favor of moderate Republican Jerry Lewis.
This time around, Pearce hoped things would be different. Redrawn political districts meant he wouldn’t have to face Lewis again. He also tried to rebrand himself as a nice guy to counter the reputation he gained as a flame-throwing immigration hawk after sponsoring the state’s harsh immigration law known as SB 1070. His campaign materials showed him smiling and holding a baby.
But the trouble came early when news broke in May that an Arizona man had shot and killed four people in a suburban house outside of Phoenix before killing himself. The man turned out to be JT Ready, a border vigilante and former confidant of Pearce. The two had a falling out years ago after Ready’s white supremacist views became public, but it left Pearce in a position of having to answer questions about the relationship in the middle of his campaign.
“When we first met JT he was fresh out of the Marine Corp and seemed like a decent person,” Pearce said at the time, adding that the two eventually parted ways. “He was angry with me and stayed angry with me, and it has been several years since I have had reason to speak with JT.”
The following month, Pearce ran into a series of financial problems. Records showed he was only able to raise $2,800 in the first five months of the year, way down compared to his haul of $260,000 to fight off the recall last year. He also hit another wall when word leaked that he was planning to host a fundraiser at a Mexican restaurant. Protesters upset with his stance on immigration ended up convincing two different restaurants to cancel the event.
In July, his nice-guy rebranding try took its biggest hit when he took to Facebook to let the world know what he thought about the Aurora, Colo., movie theater massacre where 12 people were killed and another 58 wounded. Pearce said it could have been stopped.
“All that was needed was one Courages/Brave (sic) man prepared mentally or otherwise to stop this it could have been done,” he wrote. Days later, after it turned out that one of the victims had grown up not far from Pearce’s district, he apologized.
The final humiliation, though, came just days later when campaign signs for Pearce went up all around his district bragging of an honor he received from a conservative education group. “Golden Apple Award for Eduction,” the signs said, misspelling the word education.
On Tuesday, Pearce was in hiding following his defeat. Journalists on the ground in Arizona reported that his cell phone went straight to voicemail and photographers were being thrown out of his campaign party.

Russell Pearce’s disastrous Arizona campaign is over | TPMMuckraker

Wow, I did not realize that Pearce's campaign had taken that many hits in a row. He is lucky he lost by less than 10% points with that much trouble on his plate.

W

by Yvonne Wingett Sanchez - Aug. 31, 2012 12:08 AM
The Republic | azcentral.com

Russell Pearce's primary loss this week may spell the end of his legislative career but could open the door for him to continue to push his agenda in Arizona and on the national stage.

The GOP heavyweight who led the Arizona Senate, authored the state's controversial immigration law Senate Bill 1070 and vaulted into the national spotlight with his hard-line crusade against illegal immigration, failed to make the post-recall political comeback he'd hoped for in Tuesday's state legislative primary election.

"He took an incredible gamble, and he lost," said Mike O'Neil, a public-opinion pollster. "I think it says his heyday has run its course. He had one issue and a very extreme position on that one issue. I think they're (Mesa voters) saying Russell Pearce is too extreme. We've had enough -- ease up."

But Pearce is still powerful in the Arizona GOP, serving as the the party's second-in-command. Some insiders believe Pearce could soon make a run for the top post, where he would then have the power to influence the party's priorities and messages.

He also likely still has a role as one of the national voices of illegal-immigration enforcement, which remains a hot issue nationally. GOP leaders at the Republican National Convention endorsed an immigration-platform plank that supports Arizona-style laws aimed at cracking down on illegal immigration.

"I don't think this was necessarily a referendum on immigration policy," said Dan Stein, president of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, a Washington, D.C., group that advocates more immigration enforcement. "I don't see any diminution in broad public support for candidates that are wanting to support state-level, Arizona-type models."

Campaign missteps

Throughout the primary, Pearce attempted to rebrand himself as a politician who cared about issues beyond illegal immigration, more than a dozen political observers and public officials told The Arizona Republic. But, in the end, he could not overcome the perception that he was obsessed with just one issue.

Voters in this Mesa district, which includes a heavy mix of Mormons and Catholics, grew weary of Pearce's "mean-spirited" tone of wanting to starve out "every last soul" who was undocumented, observers said.

Pearce's tone on illegal immigration turned off members of both faiths, said Mesa Councilman Dave Richins, a Mormon.

"The dehumanizing tone of illegal immigration quit resonating because people knew better, they'd served them (immigrants) in their hometowns and they knew the situations they were trying to escape," Richins said, referring to church missions. "You had Mormons and Catholics who looked at that rhetoric and said, 'Wait a minute, that's not right.' "

And at a time when Pearce was one of the Legislature's most powerful politicians, he stopped communicating with his hometown officials on issues other than illegal immigration, from impact fees to education.

"There was a lack of consideration, a lack of trying to understand or learn what our concerns were or what we could offer to the discussion," Mesa Mayor Scott Smith said. "We were on different pages, and that bred a lot of frustrations."

Pearce's campaign, much like his political career, was wounded by missteps, most of them self-inflicted, according to observers and his own campaign manager.

The public lashed out against Pearce for a Facebook post questioning the heroism of the victims of the Colorado movie-theater shooting. He was dogged by perceptions that he is motivated by racism, with his opponents using his own e-mails to allege SB 1070 was racially motivated. He was haunted by allegations from the recall election that he or his campaign put up a sham candidate to pull votes away from Pearce's opponent.

Pearce's one-time ally Gov. Jan Brewer did not endorse him during the primary. His opponent outspent and outraised him. And even his longtime friend, political consultant Chuck Coughlin, advised him early on to not run.

Pearce's campaign manager, Constantin Querard, acknowledged Pearce was partly to blame for the negative news but said Democrats and the media demonized him.

"The sheer volume of lies can be tough to overcome," he said. "And after a while, it's hard to come back from that. You get here by an accumulation of a lot of factors -- some of the wounds are self-inflicted; most of them are -- but at the end of the day, it doesn't matter."

Pearce did not return repeated calls for comment.

His brother Lester Pearce, who lost his primary race for Maricopa County supervisor, defended his brother's record before the election and blamed Democrats, moderate Republicans, attorneys and the media for Russell's expected loss.

Asked what Russell would do if he was defeated, Lester said, "Riding off in the sunset and enjoying life."

Long public career

With his barrel chest and gruff style, Pearce, 65, is an Arizona native with long ties to the Mesa district he once represented. He and his wife, LuAnne, have five children and 13 grandchildren.

Pearce has been a public servant almost his entire adult life.

He worked for the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office for 21 years, starting as a deputy and moving up to chief deputy under Sheriff Joe Arpaio. He was shot in the line of duty in 1977 during a struggle with three Latino teens.

Tom Freestone, a former county supervisor, has known Pearce since 1978, when he would lobby the Board of Supervisors on behalf of the sheriff's office.

Freestone, like many of Pearce's friends, pointed out that his entire career should not be overshadowed by his focus on immigration.

He recalled that Pearce "gets committed to something, attacks the problem full-steam ahead and doesn't raise his head up. That's how he got things done."

Before becoming a lawmaker, Pearce served as a justice of the peace and director of the state Motor Vehicle Division.

Gov. Jane Dee Hull fired him from the MVD in 1999 after state officials accused Pearce and two aides of altering the drunken-driving records of a Tucson woman so she could keep her license. Pearce denied involvement, which the Attorney General investigated. That office ultimately determined it was a personnel issue and not a criminal matter.

Pearce served in the Arizona House of Representatives from 2000 to 2008, then moved to the Senate in 2009.

His GOP colleagues in 2010 elected him Senate president. His tenure as leader of the Senate was fraught with controversy, including limiting media access and allowing senators to carry firearms on the Senate floor. He was also widely criticized for taking tens of thousands of dollars worth of free trips and game tickets from the Fiesta Bowl.

That year, he sponsored SB 1070 and rocketed to the national spotlight, where he became a hero to supporters of illegal-immigration enforcement.

His tenure coincided with the rise of the tea party, which like Pearce, promoted strict conservative interpretations of the Constitution. That "anti-government, anti-tax, anti-immigrant mentality really helped him push bills through the Legislature," said Todd Landfried of Arizona Employers for Immigration Reform, which opposes SB 1070.

But Pearce went too far with some of his colleagues in 2011 when he introduced a series of immigration-related bills, including a pair aimed at mounting a challenge to birthright citizenship. and others that required businesses to become immigration agents. The business community stepped in and 60 CEOs signed a letter urging Pearce to stop the barrage of immigration bills while the state tried to jump-start the economy and bring jobs to Arizona.

"Everyone wants to fix illegal immigration, but he's going way further than anyone else and long after it makes sense," said Tyler Montague, a Mesa Republican who voted for Pearce every election during the last decade up until last year, and then helped run Jerry Lewis' campaign against Pearce in the November recall.

People just want to move past this era."

Next steps

It's unclear what's next for Russell Pearce. Some speculate he could go on a national speaking tour or become the leader of a political-action committee. Others suggested he could play a larger role in state party politics.

Coughlin advised Pearce before the primary to give up on vindication and, instead, start a national PAC to spread his hard-line message on illegal immigration to the faithful.

"I didn't think, as his friend and somebody who knows him and knows his heart on these matters ... that it was in his best interest to run," Coughlin said, adding that he encouraged Pearce to go national with his message because "he has a very passionate base of support that feel that he's being martyred and victimized."

Pearce didn't take the advice, and Coughlin offered his condolences to his friend on election night via text message.

Querard said Pearce's career is far from over and believes the former lawmaker could be more effective as a leader of the "conservative movement," without the constraints that come with being an elected official.

"In Arizona and nationally, he's still a big draw," Querard said before the election. "Win or lose, he will remain a hero to a really large, meaningful number of people who have the utmost respect and admiration for him."

Insiders pointed out that Pearce could play a more powerful role in state politics. On election day, he was handing out fliers and stumping for precinct-committee candidates. The current GOP chairman's term expires in January.

Stein said Pearce's loss has no broader implications nationally. He said many Americans still support conservative measures to combat illegal immigration, including tough immigration enforcement.

"I don't think there's any real national lesson here; it just shows that every legislative district is unique and different," Stein said.

Russell Pearce beaten but still a force