‘That’s the best you can do?’ Masters smokes Dem candidate Mark Kelly in heated Arizona border debate

Arizona Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly has a slight lead over Republican challenger Blake Masters, who has been slowly closing the gap as voters get set to go to the polls.

The politicians squared off Thursday evening in a debate held in Phoenix, with President Joe Biden’s handling of the U.S. economy being a key issue, along with border security and reproductive rights.

Masters shared a story about high inflation causing some parents to skip meals to ensure that their children can eat.

“This crushing inflation is ruining people’s lives,” Masters said. “I had parents come up to me two weeks ago to a campaign event. They said Blake, we don’t eat breakfast anymore. We drink coffee. We drink coffee so that we can afford to feed our kids breakfast. And that’s on you, sir. This is the Joe Biden-Mark Kelly economy.”

Kelly pointed to the COVID-19 pandemic, which he referred to as “something unprecedented,” as being responsible for the current state of the economy — which is somewhat accurate, given all the pandemic spending seen from the Biden administration.

Except the former astronaut painted the federal government as stepping in to save the day

“Two and a half years ago, we went through something unprecedented. You know, COVID-19, schools had to shut down. Businesses shut down across Arizona,” he said. “Sometimes the federal government has to step in to save small business. You know, they have to step in to protect livelihoods.”

The Democratic senator also touted working with Republicans, saying: “Families are struggling and often can’t afford gas or prescription medication, so I worked with Republicans to bring manufacturing back to America to cut costs.”

Par for the course when it comes to debate moderators these days, Masters was asked the prerequisite “gotcha” question about whether Biden was legitimately elected as president in 2020.

“Absolutely…have you seen the gas prices lately?” the Republican smartly replied.

“Joe Biden is spending like a drunken sailor at every single opportunity. Mark Kelly just says yes. He can’t say no to [Senate Majority Leader] Chuck Schumer. He can’t say no to Joe Biden,” Masters added.

On the border crisis, Kelly was quick to distance himself from President Biden in regard to the record level of illegal immigrants invading America — the numbers are in the millions since Biden took office less than two years ago.

“I’ve been strong on border security and I’ve stood up to Democrats when they’re wrong on this issue including the president,” Kelly said. “When the president decided he was going to do something dumb on this and change the rules, you know, that would create a bigger crisis.”

“You know, I told him he was wrong. So I pushed back on this administration multiple times,” he added. “And I’ve got more money on the ground to increase Border Patrol staffing technology and where it makes sense to build more barriers.”

Though nothing was done to stem the flow, Kelly painted himself as a DC outsider who was fighting for Arizonans all along.

“Washington, D.C. has failed on the border,” he said. “Washington, D.C. has failed on this issue of border security and immigration for decades. And it’s been crisis after crisis. I’ve been focused on this since day one, you know, and I brought more resources here to the state of Arizona to deal with it.”

Masters pointed out the obvious, that untold numbers of migrants are walking into the United States and that Kelly was simply not doing enough.

“If this is the result of Senator Kelly being focused on the border, my gosh, he’s the most ineffective and worst senator of all time,” the GOP candidate said. “The border is wide open. People are walking through by the hundreds of thousands.”

Below is a clip of one of Masters’ strongest moments during the heated debate:

https://twitter.com/RNCResearch/status/1578195453442662400

“Tonight I exposed Senator Mark Kelly for what he is: a rubber stamp for Joe Biden’s failed agenda,” Masters tweeted afterward, in a fundraising appeal that featured a clip on the exchange on the border where he suggested Kelly resign “if that’s the best you can do.”

On the issue of reproductive rights, Masters said he supports a 15-week abortion limit and charged that Kelly believes in “no limits” regarding the killing of unborn babies. Kelly painted his GOP opponent as an extremist, claiming he supports a total abortion ban — which Masters denied.

Tom Tillison

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