National GOP pulls some money from Arizona's U.S. Senate race, at least for now

Two weeks after Republican U.S. Senate candidate Blake Masters clinched his party’s nomination, a key national GOP organization has cut some of its planned financial support in Arizona that, at least for the moment, reduces its spending in his race.

The National Republican Senatorial Committee canceled a week’s worth of mid-August ads in Arizona worth $1.4 million and about $2.1 million in ads planned to run in late September through much of October, according to figures tracked by AdImpact, a nonpartisan media research company, and shared with The Arizona Republic.

The committee, which is the arm of the national GOP that is dedicated to electing Republicans to the Senate, added back about $800,000 in ads for mid-September.

Chris Hartline, a National Republican Senatorial Committee spokesperson, said the organization plans to reprogram money that it would have spent without Masters’ input back into the Arizona race in coordination with Masters’ campaign.

“We’re not abandoning Arizona. We’re not taking money from Arizona and spending it elsewhere,” Hartline said.

“We can get better (advertising) rates if we do coordinated spending and hybrid ads with our candidates than we can from the (independent expenditure) side.” He acknowledged the discount for coordinated spending had always existed.

“We’ve found a lot of success going with the hybrid and coordinated route because of the rates and the control that we have,” he said.

The coordinated spending, however, is capped at about $622,000 in Arizona. Hybrid ads allow campaigns and their party supporters to split the cost of advertising, but the resulting message needs to emphasize both candidates and parties.

For Masters, it might mean ads that pillory Democrats generally as much as his opponent, Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., specifically.

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Neither the Masters nor the Kelly campaigns commented about the funding changes.

There is still time for the committee to invest more heavily in its bid to oust Kelly, and spending shifts repeatedly as the calendar moves closer to the elections.

But the Arizona cutback, along with a $5.5 million pullback in the Philadelphia market of Pennsylvania’s Senate race, suggests surprising austerity in places long viewed as critical to the GOP’s chances of retaking the chamber in the November elections.

The financial shift happens as Kelly continues to buy more advertising time and when he was already among the most prolific Senate candidates on that front.

The New York Times first reported the spending cuts, along with a reduction in Wisconsin’s Senate race, too. The Times cited a slowdown in fundraising for the GOP’s main Senate advocacy arm, along with other key conservative groups.

Politico separately cited an unnamed Republican strategist expressing alarm at cutbacks in August, saying, “I’ve never seen it like this before.”

If Republicans and the National Republican Senatorial Committee say they are united in their effort to back Masters, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, introduced doubt Sunday during comments at a Turning Point Action event in Phoenix for the GOP’s top two races in Arizona.

“You had a primary. These are important, tough races. But the important thing happens is you have those fights and then when they’re over, we all get on the same team, and we make sure we’re united going against the Democrats,” DeSantis said.

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“I’d like to see that here in Arizona. I also think it’s very important that every major Republican organization, from the governors association to the national senatorial committee, all of them need to be all in in the state of Arizona for this election.”

Masters has enjoyed at least $15 million in supportive spending from billionaire Peter Thiel and has the backing of former President Donald Trump, who has a well-funded war chest, too.

As of mid-July, Masters had $1.6 million in campaign cash compared with Kelly’s $24.8 million. He has about nine weeks from winning the nomination to the beginning of early voting to raise money to compete with Kelly, who was unchallenged in his party’s primary.

The cash disparity could make Masters more reliant on party money and benefactors such as Thiel, who can spend unlimited amounts in the race as long as it isn’t coordinated with Masters and his campaign.

Arizona, the state with the closest presidential result in 2020, is widely expected once again to be a political battleground in the midterm elections.

Campaign operatives in both parties long ago circled the Senate race as among the nation’s most pivotal. The Senate is evenly divided between 50 Republicans and 50 senators who vote with Democrats.

AdImpact reported Arizona's Senate contest had $73 million in pre-booked advertising as of late July. Only Senate contests in Georgia, Nevada and Pennsylvania had more.

Of that, Kelly’s campaign had reserved $11.9 million, second only to Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga., who had $22.4 million, according to AdImpact.

Metro Phoenix trailed only Las Vegas for spending in a single market. Phoenix had about $95 million in pre-booked spending and Las Vegas had $135 million.

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AdImpact notes that Senate races account for nearly half the pre-booked spending nationally. Governor’s races account for nearly 20%, with the rest reserved for U.S. House races.

Independent political analysts have said Masters’ campaign is freighted by controversial college-era polemics he wrote while a student at Stanford University and by a comment at a forum in June where he said, “Maybe we should privatize Social Security.”

Masters told The Republic in a recent interview that he would never cut Social Security and wants to encourage separate private investment by young Americans. He said his earlier writings do not reflect the adult he is today.

Reach the reporter Ronald J. Hansen at ronald.hansen@arizonarepublic.com or 602-444-4493. Follow him on Twitter @ronaldjhansen.

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: GOP committee pulls money from Arizona Senate race