Republican former President Donald Trump has endorsed Mark Finchem, a Republican Arizona Secretary of State candidate who has previously identified as a member of Oath Keepers. President Donald Trump has given his influential endorsement in the race for Arizona’s top election official. On Monday, he backed Tucson-area Rep. Mark Finchem, who was at the Jan. 6 insurrection and worked to overturn Trump’s 2020 loss. It’s likely to be crucial in the crowded Republican primary for secretary of state. The seat is open as Democratic incumbent Katie Hobbs runs for governor.
Who is Mark Finchem?
Mark W. Finchem is an American politician serving as a member of the Arizona House of Representatives representing District 11 since January 5, 2015. Finchem is also a member of several far-right organizations. He is the Arizona Coordinator for the Coalition of the Western States, an organization that opposes the activities of the Bureau of Land Management and supported the occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in 2016. Finchem is also a member of the militia group Oath Keepers.
Mark Finchem’s Career
After graduating high school, he worked as a firefighter and police officer in Kalamazoo, retiring in 1999. He lived in Delton, Michigan, where he also worked as a rancher. He then moved to Tucson, Arizona, where he worked for the business and financial software company Intuit before becoming a real estate broker.
More on Trump and Finchem
Trump calls Finchem “a true warrior” who “was willing to say what few others had the courage to say.” Finchem brought Trump attorneys to Phoenix after the election to air bogus allegations of fraud related to the 2020 election. Finchem has long repeated the baseless claim that an unprecedented nationwide conspiracy of voter fraud “stole” the 2020 election from Trump. If he becomes Arizona’s Secretary of State, Finchem will become the state’s top official overseeing elections in the swing state.
Trump’s endorsement of Tucson-area Rep. Mark Finchem is likely to be crucial in the crowded Republican primary for Arizona secretary of state.
Finchem has centred much of his campaign on the need to restore “election integrity,” with a statement on the homepage of his website reading that he “knew something was very wrong with our elections process.” He’s also backed lawsuits from the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee in Arizona alleging fraud following the 2020 election.
The endorsement for Finchem lands in a state that emerged as a focal point for Trump’s campaign to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential race. Republicans in the Arizona state Senate have launched an election audit, though the process has come under bipartisan criticism.
Finchem is running against at least three other Republicans in the GOP primary, while state Rep. Reginald Bolding and Marine veteran Adrian Fontes are running in the Democratic primary. Katie Hobbs, the current Democratic secretary of state, is running for the open governor’s seat in Arizona in 2022.
Former President Trump endorsed Arizona state Rep. Mark Finchem for Arizona secretary of state, backing a key supporter of his voter fraud claims to oversee the Grand Canyon State’s elections. In a statement endorsing Finchem, which was disseminated by the former president’s leadership PAC, Trump specifically cited Finchem’s backing of his election fraud claims and touted the state lawmaker as a supporter of his agenda.
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