Why is Kari Lake doing well but Doug Mastriano flopping

[Tekken_Guy]

Lake and Mastriano are the two Trumpiest gubernatorial candidates running in swing states?

But Lake is in good position while Mastriano is not, what's wrong?

[President Johnson]

Arizona is less Democratic-friendly statewide, I guess? Two more factors: Neither is Hobbs nearly as strong as Shapiro as a candidate and Lake has also much more ressources and support from within the national party. Also, she seems more "entertaining" than Mastriano.

It's still disappointing this insane lunatic has a serious shot to win.

[Not Me, Us]

Arizona is less Democratic-friendly statewide, I guess? Two more factors: Neither is Hobbs nearly as strong as Shapiro as a candidate and Lake has also much more ressources and support from within the national party. Also, she seems more "entertaining" than Mastriano.

It's still disappointing this insane lunatic has a serious shot to win.

At least Arizona has fewer electoral votes, it'll matter less when Republicans rig the election there.

[Devout Centrist]

Lake has money, a successful media career, and name rec. Mastriano has none of those.

[HidingCommentary]

There are Biden voters who also voted for Jan Brewer and Doug Ducey. Why wouldn't they feel inclined to vote for Lake? Serious question.

[Cyrusman]

Multiple reasons.

1. Arizona is culturally and politicly redder than PA. Trump cost this state himself in 2020. He talked sh**t about McCain nonstop for 5+ years and barely lost the state by 10,000 votes in an awful environment for himself.

2.) Atlas has a very different view of Lake than AZ does. Lake is very well known in AZ and before this cycle there was never any mention of her ever being extreme, crazy or any of those words Atlas or people on the left describe her as. When a state sees someone every day for 20 years or so, they get to know them.

3.) Lake is way more polished and eloquent than Mastriano is and she is doing a good job on running on the issues than really matter to AZ- the border being a great example.

4.) Shapiro is 50x the candidate Hobbs is. Hobbs comes across like a scared, timid little puppy who hopes she can hide away while Lake shoots herself in the foot.

[Southern Reactionary Dem]

Because despite what some fellow red avatars seem to think, Kari Lake actually isn't a bad candidate just because we really don't like her policies and muh democracy and stuff. She's very personable, a former broadcaster and very well spoken as such. Right or wrong, she is very good at projecting strength, is great in front of a camera and is quick witted whereas her opponent has unfortunately shown herself to be otherwise. Hobbs has been stumbling in confrontations and interviews as of late and refuses to debate. Not a good look. Also, Rs have a higher floor in AZ than PA and Shapiro is a better candidate than Hobbs by a mile. Mastriano also just seems pretty dull.

[Vosem]

Lake and Mastriano are the two Trumpiest gubernatorial candidates running in swing states?

But Lake is in good position while Mastriano is not, what's wrong?

Mastriano is a Kobach-ite statist religious nationalist who is actually way outside the GOP mainstream. (Note that everyone is willing to tolerate non-statist religious nationalists, who are basically an integral part of the coalition, but Mastriano is actually something quite different from what a typical hard-right Republican would be somewhere like rural Idaho or whatever). He won the nomination by a weird streak of luck, where there was a large number of undecideds because of the wide-open race and Trump simply endorsed the person running in first to try to notch a 'win' rather than examining what Mastriano was. Note that he was polling around 15-20% in the primary before the Trump endorsement, and note that -- perhaps counterintuitively -- this percentage is one that would be smaller outside the Northeast.

Lake is a basically normal anti-immigration populist, down to being a celebrity (which anti-immigration populists like). Her campaign has been very clearly inspired by and modeled after Trump 2016, which was successful nationally. They're actually quite different.

(Also, a marginal effect here but still needs to be said, Hobbs has been running a very weak campaign and Shapiro a very strong one. But the important differences here are between the Republican candidates).

[Calthrina950]

I fully agree with the last three posts. It basically comes down to candidate quality. Lake is a much stronger candidate than Mastriano, and Shapiro is a much stronger candidate than Hobbs.

[If my soul was made of stone]

Is Hobbs even campaigning?

[Senator Incitatus]

Because Lake is a good candidate (a well-known news reporter, with charisma to boot) and Mastriano is not (an isolated Senate backbencher with a severely online following and no fundraising network or personal appeal). They're barely comparable.

Their politics have little-to-nothing to do with their quality as candidates, except insofar as the distinctly religious tinge of Mastriano's might turn off conservatives of other religions. I disagree with Vosem's take that Mastriano is comparable Kobach; I think Kobach's politics (focused on immigration and crime) are even closer to Lake's, and I was under the impression, possibly mistaken, that Mastriano suffers from a severely libertarian economics.

And yes, Shapiro is a much stronger candidate than Hobbs.

[Real Texan Politics]

One has funding and name recognition, the other does not.

Plus Arizona is more republican than Pennsylvania but it’s mainly the above factor.

[2016]

One has funding and name recognition, the other does not.

Plus Arizona is more republican than Pennsylvania but it’s mainly the above factor.

Agreed! Lake is also not as inflammatory as Mastriano.

Despite no Debates Lake also presents herself very well and Hobbs is like the Martha Coakley who lost to Scott Brown in 2010 and Charlie Baker in 2014.

[SnowLabrador]

Doug Mastriano frightens a lot of people, including independents, and is barely running a campaign. Meanwhile, Kari Lake is not only campaigning, her opponent is refusing to debate her, which is never a good look. Lake is completely insane, but she's good at pretending she's not completely insane.

[TodayJunior]

She's telegenic, and the GOP is actually spending money on this race. It doesn't hurt she's a known figure in AZ for the last 27 years either, so the attacks are harder to stick.

[Leading Political Consultant Ma Anand Sheela]

Is Hobbs even campaigning?

My possibly wrong impression is that she's doing more campaigning than the narrative suggests, if not enough or a particularly effective kind. The bigger problem IMO is that said narrative has also fixated on the idea of Lake as an easily beatable Hysterical Woman and not someone who, as it turns out, might have considerable strengths of her own as a candidate.

[Person Man]

Lake has money, a successful media career, and name rec. Mastriano has none of those.

So social skills, basically.

[If my soul was made of stone]

Is Hobbs even campaigning?

My possibly wrong impression is that she's doing more campaigning than the narrative suggests, if not enough or a particularly effective kind. The bigger problem IMO is that said narrative has also fixated on the idea of Lake as an easily beatable Hysterical Woman and not someone who, as it turns out, might have considerable strengths of her own as a candidate.

but i thought hysterical woman qelli ward who has personally defecated on john mccain's grave seventeen times and denied the sacred king of the golden bough would make the az gop lose every election ever like the va gop

[xavier110]

Is Hobbs even campaigning?

My possibly wrong impression is that she's doing more campaigning than the narrative suggests, if not enough or a particularly effective kind. The bigger problem IMO is that said narrative has also fixated on the idea of Lake as an easily beatable Hysterical Woman and not someone who, as it turns out, might have considerable strengths of her own as a candidate.

If you look on Twitter or on AZ Politics on Reddit, you’ll see that Arizonans who lean D are universally annoyed with Hobbs. I agree that the disappointment isn’t around her not campaigning. She’s campaigning.

It’s around how she’s campaigning.

https://mobile.twitter.com/TimJarrellAZ/status/1580980840141463552

I figure someone like the above hasn’t heard from her because she’s being ultra low key and not making news.

The philosophical debate here is do you need to bring the heat when up against a hot head? I think the answer is obviously yes, and it feels like Ds are yearning for someone to fight, especially if Hobbs is going to LEAN INTO rhetoric around Lake being a threat to civil society.

You can’t say that while acting sheepish. It feels like she’s planted absolutely no traps for Lake to walk into.

Lake, meanwhile, despite what every non-AZer here thinks, does conjure up some positive associations for people who’ve watched her for two decades. It’s like if Regis Philbin or, I don’t know, your local newscaster you grew up with suddenly went demented. If she loses, it’s got nothing to do with Hobbs and everything to do with Trump and know-nothingness being radioactive to the middle here.

Hobbs has tried to let her own the space a bit to self-inflict wounds, but it’s also letting Lake set the terms of the debate and make her case against Hobbs.

[Progressive Pessimist]

Well, she doesn't look like a toe for one thing. But then again neither does Tudor Dixon.

[Aurelius]

Charisma. Name recognition. Attractiveness. Quality of opposing candidate. Campaigning skills.

Candidate quality matters. Candidate quality matters. Candidate quality matters. There are huge numbers of voters out there who do not plug all the candidates' policies into a spreadsheet and vote based on that. Charisma matters. Keep repeating this to yourself until you'll never forget it.

[Smash255]

1.  Lake is running a stronger campaign than Mastriano
2.  Arizona isn't quite as Democratic as PA
3.  Shapiro is running a better campaign than Hobbs
4.  As nuts as Lake is, Mastriano is crazier
5.  Tying into # 3, Hobbs's refusal to debate.  Not only does refusing to debate come across as a bad look, but a debate would give a chance for Hobbs to show how completely insane Lake actually is.  It is a lay up that she is passing up. 

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

Beyond the reasons other users have stated, appearance matters.

IMO, being a far-right female politician is objectively easier, and Lake is also more polished. On the other hand, Mastriano looks like (and is) a Nazi skinhead.

[Inmate Trump]

I have no idea but…

Hobbs’ refusal to debate Lake was a serious and stupid error.

[Alben Barkley]

I have no idea but…

Hobbs’ refusal to debate Lake was a serious and stupid error.

Gretchen Whitmer debated Tudor Dixon.

Raphael Warnock debated Herschel Walker.

Makes no sense to me why Hobbs ducked out of debates with Lake when she arguably had more to gain and less to lose than those two.

As for the OP question: Lake has run a better campaign and is a stronger candidate. She's photogenic and is well-known as a TV personality in Arizona. She may have equally crazy views as Mastriano, but doesn't come across as a raving lunatic the way he does. Arizona is also a fundamentally more R state at the state level. It would be quite surprising if it elected a Republican senator and Democratic governor at the same time while the same wouldn't be so surprising for Pennsylvania. Tom Wolf won Pennsylvania by 17(!) points in 2018, and Shapiro is such a popular figure with such a moderate reputation some GOP ads in the state are literally positively comparing him to Fetterman. Last time Arizona had a Democratic governor was Janet Napolitano. Hobbs does not seem like a very strong candidate in comparison. I hope she wins, but if she does it will probably be due to a combination of Arizona continuing to trend left (probably especially against Trumpy candidates) and the national environment being bluer than expected. And perhaps she can especially thank Dobbs for the win. Because without it I'd think she's all but dead in the water.