The case for each of 6 Democrats vying to unseat Rep. David Schweikert

The biggest disappointment in the CD1 Democratic primary has been the blown opportunities by the six candidates to distinguish themselves.

As a result, the race may well be decided not by policy, or even personality, but by negative campaigns.

The dominant debate in recent weeks centered on whether having a Republican past is disqualifying.

The debate could be so much more.

So, who’s the strongest or most appealing pick to challenge incumbent and presumptive GOP nominee David Schweikert?

A case could be made for just about any of the six.

Candidates missed chances to tell their stories

Each has an origin story that would help craft a narrative for their campaign, but none fully took advantage.

Certainly not in the two televised debates, which were their best shot — the only realistic one, anyway — to define themselves to voters.

Andrew Horne, an orthodontist, recounts getting an “active shooter” alert from the school his young daughter attends — an incident that he said propelled him to run for office. Yet he didn’t fully make that connection to his platform of expanded background checks, mandatory gun locks and other firearms reforms.

Andrei Cherny, a former chair of the Arizona Democratic Party who vaulted into President Bill Clinton’s administration out of college (and, later, into President Obama’s administration), failed to say how the experience influenced what’s important to him or what relevance to Arizona that bears in 2024.

And so on.

Here are the advantages and nagging questions for each candidate:

Marlene Galán-Woods

ADVANTAGE: The widow of former state attorney and moderate Republican Grant Woods, Galán-Woods has the backing of much of the Democratic establishment, including Attorney General Kris Mayes, U.S. Rep. Raúl Grijalva and former Gov. Janet Napolitano. She’s the only woman — and the only candidate backed by EMILYs List, an abortion-rights group — in an election cycle in which abortion access is a dominant issue. That helps blunt foes’ criticism of her as a former Republican.

NAGGING QUESTION: How could someone who as a Republican disagreed with her party’s policies have stayed so mum, including on the controversial 2010 immigration legislation Senate Bill 1070, which she said she found “terrifying” as a Latina?

Amish Shah

ADVANTAGE: The only candidate to have won office (three times as a Arizona state lawmaker) and who got more bills passed in a Republican-controlled statehouse than other Democrats in recent years.

NAGGING QUESTION: For a doctor who sees a connection between his experiences in the emergency room and issues of health care access, gun violence and abortion, Shah said little beyond superficial talking points about what Congress can and should do to make improvements in those areas. What beyond abortion rights does he look to advance?

Conor O'Callaghan

ADVANTAGE: He has a campaign team that got the rare Democrat elected to a statewide office (Adrian Fontes, to secretary of state). He also can fundraise, given his Wall Street background and personal wealth. He exudes confidence and knows how to throw sharp elbows.

O'Callaghan deserves thanks: For pressing his opponents

NAGGING QUESTION: Do all those attacks on other candidates — the ones on Shah are particularly misleading — turn off Democrats voting in the primary? What does O’Callaghan stand for other than as a countering, partisan voice against Republicans?

Kurt Kroemer

ADVANTAGE: Kroemer is the only candidate in the field who believes there’s no real crisis or chaos at the border, that the problem is largely a bottlenecked asylum process being exploited by Republicans. He preaches speaking the truth — on democracy and election integrity, too — and does so with poise and calm.

NAGGING QUESTION: Like several others, Kroemer fails to connect his experience to the campaign. He worked in the American Red Cross and mentions situations such as mass shootings and with refugees and border communities. But how do they inform his priorities or ideas?

Andrei Cherny

ADVANTAGE: Cherny has a wealth of experience in Democratic politics, from serving as an aide and speechwriter for Bill Clinton and Al Gore to being co-founder of a public policy journal credited with helping to launch the career of U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren. He’s long championed traditional Democratic issues such as health care access, climate control and less favorable tax treatment for corporations.

NAGGING QUESTION: Partly because of his inability to break through, the defining question for Cherny has become, how damaging is the ongoing federal investigation of the eco-friendly company he co-founded over accusations of misleading customers?

Andrew Horne

ADVANTAGE: Horne’s introductory line in debates is as memorable as any: “My name is Andrew Horne, and I’m not related to Tom Horne,” the conservative state schools superintendent and one-time attorney general. A political novice, his story about the “active shooter” notification at his child’s school resonates with parents and gun-reform advocates.

NAGGING QUESTION: Aside from failing to fully connect the anecdote to his platform on federal firearm regulations, Horne, oddly, cites education as his No. 1 priority. But given that education is largely a local issue, what role does Congress have, and how would he effect it?

Want to know more?

With early voting starting this week, the race will be determined by which candidate has the strongest ground game to turn out the vote and perhaps by a late blitz of mailers and text campaigns.

One welcoming source for deeper insight is “Who's the 1?,” a podcast exploring the CD1 primary hosted by former radio journalist Steve Goldstein and Democrat Anita Malik, who ran twice for Schweikert’s seat (when it was in CD 6).

The two offer valuable observations, including one-on-one conversations with the candidates and with some voters in the district.

The podcast may influence the undecided vote as much as anything.

Reach Abe Kwok at akwok@azcentral.com. On X, formerly Twitter: @abekwok.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: David Schweikert has 6 strong Democrats in the race to unseat him