“Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) is hitting the TV airwaves in Arizona on Friday, putting up a $500,000 ad buy targeting Kari Lake and Mark Finchem, the Republican candidates for Arizona governor and Secretary of State who have repeatedly said they would not have certified Joe Biden’s 2020 win in the state,” NBC News reports.

Says Cheney, in the ad: “I don’t know that I have ever voted for a Democrat, but if I lived in Arizona, I absolutely would.”

Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake (R) is out with a new ad that says voters “deserve a gubernatorial debate” and slams Katie Hobbs (D) for being “too timid” to take part in a debate.

“In the homestretch of Arizona’s high-stakes contest for governor, Democratic Secretary of State Katie Hobbs has refused to debate her Republican opponent, MAGA firebrand Kari Lake, while also maintaining a low-key campaign schedule and facing being outspent on the airwaves in the closing weeks of the race,” NBC News reports.

“As Lake barnstorms the state, some supporters, including Democrats and anti-Lake Republicans — a key constituency Hobbs needs to win over in a state where voter registrations are essentially split into thirds among Democrats, Republicans and independents — have expressed concern.”

Arizona gubernatorial candidate Katie Hobbs (D) was a student leader at her Catholic preparatory high school when pupils took part in a yearly tradition known as “Slave Day,” the Daily Mail reports.

The tradition involved freshman “slaves” following orders from senior “masters.”

Elaine Godfrey: “The way Lake has imitated Trump’s rhetoric is obvious, but as I’ve followed her in the months since, something else has become clear: She is much better at this than Trump’s other emulators. That makes sense, given her first career in front of the camera, cultivating trust among thousands of Maricopa County viewers. But this is more than imitation: Lake has made MAGA her own.”

Key takeaway: “Lake is an elegant, polished speaker. Unlike Trump, she doesn’t ruminate on flushing toilets or offer random asides about stabbings and rapes. She presents a calm self-assurance that can make even the wackiest conspiracy theories seem plausible.”

A new Arizona Republic/Suffolk University poll in Arizona finds Katie Hobbs (D) holds a razor-thin lead over Kari Lake (R) in the gubernatorial race, 46% to 45%.

For comparison, the FiveThirtyEight polling average finds Hobbs leading by two percentage points.

“The Republican Governors Association is going to put at least $11 million into commercials to ensure that Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey’s successor is of the same political party,” the Arizona Daily Star reports.

“But don’t look for that money to be spent extolling the virtues of Kari Lake, the GOP nominee for governor. Instead, given the organization’s record, the commercials are more likely to be unapologetic, no-holds-barred attacks on Democratic gubernatorial nominee Katie Hobbs.”

Kari Lake (R) has won the Republican primary for Arizona governor, the Associated Press reports.

Arizona Agenda: “In the past five months, two-thirds of Democrat Katie Hobbs’ gubernatorial campaign staff have left, and several describe the campaign as an emotionally abusive atmosphere that got so bad, they were to upend their lives and plans mid-election and seek employment elsewhere.”

“The problem isn’t Hobbs herself, the former staffers told us. Instead, it was created by a new campaign manager.”

Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake (R) — who was endorsed by Donald Trump — shared a post on Facebook stating that Trump was “Not My President” just days before the former president’s inauguration in 2017, Fox News reports.

Former Vice President Mike Pence will hold events on Friday for Karrin Taylor Robson (R) in the GOP primary race for Arizona governor, the Arizona Republic reports.

The same day, Pence’s old boss, former President Donald Trump, is set to hold a rally boosting rival candidate Kari Lake (R), “bringing the civil war within the Republican party to the battleground state with the primary election little more than a week away.”

“Former Vice President Mike Pence is endorsing Republican Karrin Taylor Robson in the Arizona governor’s race, pitting himself against Donald Trump in a primary that is emerging as a proxy fight between the former president and Republicans who resisted his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results,” Politico reports.

“It represents the latest breach in the relationship between Trump and Pence, and it’s the second time the two have collided in a primary. And Pence is slated to campaign for Robson on Friday — creating a dramatic split-screen moment opposite Trump, who is set to hold a rally for his endorsed candidate, former local TV news anchor Kari Lake, the same day.”

“Despite running as a staunchly anti-transgender and anti-abortion candidate, far-right Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake once posted in support of transgender youth and asked her followers about aborting fetuses who would be born with disabilities in social media posts from 2015 and 2016,” CNN reports.

“In a last major test of Donald Trump’s Republican power this year, Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey (R) endorsed a potential successor who’s going up against a candidate backed by the former president,” NBC News reports.

“Ducey’s defiance of Trump in supporting Karrin Taylor Robson (R) over Kari Lake (R) marks the third swing-state governor’s race — following primaries in Georgia and Pennsylvania — in which Republican establishment figures have resisted Trump and his preferred candidates.”

“One of the Phoenix area’s best-known drag queens is calling his former friend — candidate for governor Kari Lake (R) — a hypocrite after Lake weighed in on drag performances, the latest front in the conservative culture war,” the Arizona Republic reports.

“Richard Stevens, who has performed for 25 years as Barbra Seville, said he was disappointed and decided to speak out after Lake tweeted Friday that ‘they kicked God out of schools and welcomed the Drag Queens. They took down our Flag and replaced it with a rainbow.’”

“Stevens shared pictures and texts from Lake in several social media posts and said Lake had attended countless shows and private events over the decades of their friendship. He said he had performed as Marilyn Monroe in front of Lake’s daughter when she was 9 or 10 years old.”

Lake posted a response on Instagram which included calling the media the “enemy of the people” and “the right hand of the devil.”