“Part Of A Larger, Ugly Pattern” – News Coverage Calls Out Blake Masters For Offensive Remarks & Controversial Views

In the week since landing Trump’s endorsement, Arizona GOP Senate candidate Blake Masters has faced a wave of brutal news coverage. This week alone:

• Masters’ blog posts uncovered this week by Jewish Insider show he “called for ‘unrestricted’ immigration while praising drug smugglers as ‘heroes,’” – on top of many other “extreme and often contrarian views.”

• New audio from CNN reveals Masters suggested January 6th “may have been a false-flag operation set up by the FBI;”

• NBC News reported on comments from Masters suggesting that “‘Black people, frankly’ are to blame for America’s gun violence problem;”

• And the Tucson Sentinel reported that Masters recently “rough[ed] up” a protester and “put both hands around his neck and pushed him backward.”

• The wave of coverage follows last week’s reporting by HuffPost on audio revealing “Blake Masters Agrees Disclosing Campaign Donors Is Like ‘Kristallnacht’.”

See for yourself:

CNN: Audio shows Trump-endorsed Arizona Senate candidate questioned whether January 6 attack was set up by FBI

• Blake Masters, the Republican Senate candidate from Arizona, met with conservative activists at a Phoenix IHOP this spring and was asked whether he would support investigating US intelligence operations to uncover the federal government’s “nefarious activities.”

• Masters replied, “Absolutely,” and then floated the conspiracy theory that the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol actually may have been a false-flag operation set up by the FBI, according to a recording of the March 30 meeting obtained by CNN.

• “Don’t we suspect that like one-third of the people outside of the Capitol complex on January 6 were actual FBI agents hanging out,” Masters asked at the GrassRoots Tea Party Activists of Arizona event. “What did people know and when did they know it? We got to get to the bottom of this.”

Jewish Insider: The Evolution of Blake Masters

• The Arizona GOP Senate candidate — who just earned Trump’s blessing — decries ‘open borders’ but once called for ‘unrestricted’ immigration while praising drug smugglers as ‘heroes’

• In a series of short, polemical blog posts, Masters once suggested that “illegal immigration is an ethical contradiction in terms,” argued that “‘unrestricted’ immigration is the only choice,” and commended U.S. service members who had participated in a drug trafficking ring along the southwestern border as “heroes,” among other things.

• His older writings suggest a deeper penchant for extreme and often contrarian views that seem to be a defining feature of his political self-conception.

• “I don’t care about the Supreme Court,” Masters declared at the beginning of one entry. “It just doesn’t matter.”

HuffPost: Blake Masters Agrees Disclosing Campaign Donors Is Like ‘Kristallnacht’

• Arizona GOP Senate candidate Blake Masters complained about having to disclose donations under federal campaign finance law in a recent podcast interview, appearing to agree with the suggestion that it’s similar to Kristallnacht, the Nazi attack on Jews in 1938.

• Greg Medford, the host of the podcast, responded: “Right, that’s like Kristallnacht. That’s like Kristallnacht.”

• “Yeah, that’s right,” Masters said.

NBC News: Trump-backed Senate candidate Blake Masters of Arizona blames gun violence on Black people

• Blake Masters, a Republican candidate for the Senate in Arizona who was recently endorsed by former President Donald Trump, said on a podcast this year that “Black people, frankly” are to blame for America’s gun violence problem.

• During the same podcast, when asked what he thought about President Joe Biden’s Supreme Court nominee Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, the first Black woman confirmed to the court, Masters said she was “a horrible pick” and that she was an “affirmative action candidate.”

• He has also repeatedly echoed the “great replacement theory” — a white supremacist conspiracy theory that there is a plot to diminish the influence of white people in the U.S. — by baselessly claiming that Democrats want to grant amnesty to thousands of immigrants in order to “make them voters.”

MSNBC: Trump-backed Senate hopeful pushes racist line on gun violence

• The Trump-backed Senate hopeful in Arizona was asked for his thoughts about gun violence. His racist response was part of a larger, ugly pattern.

• The Arizonan has also been an enthusiastic proponent of Trump’s lies about the 2020 election, insists the gender pay gap is just a “left-wing narrative,” and has not only denounced the Griswold v. Connecticut precedent, he’s told voters that he’ll only vote to confirm judges who agree with him. (This is the Supreme Court case that said states can’t ban contraception for married couples.)

• This week, one of Masters’ primary rivals launched a related ad, reminding Arizonans about Masters’ apparent belief that World War II wasn’t a “just” conflict, his record of quoting a notorious anti-Semite, and his praise for the Unabomber.

3TV/CBS 5 Phoenix (WATCH): GOP Senate candidate Blake Masters blames gun violence on Black people

• The publisher of Arizona’s only Black-owned newspaper says Masters’ comments show he’s not the right person to represent Arizona. “I think those comments automatically disqualifies himself. When you start making those comments without having any background, any proof, or any information on that… It just shows that he’s not qualified to be a candidate – not even for dog-catcher.”

Tucson Sentinel: Shearer: GOP Senate candidate Blake Masters roughs up 73-year-old Dem. protester in Green Valley

• Then out of nowhere comes Blake Masters, a U.S. Senate candidate who’d been glad-handing in the background.

• Masters lunged at Jackson, put both hands around his neck and pushed him backward.

• This might be a good time to point out that Masters, at 35, is less than half Jackson’s age.

• I contacted Blake Masters’ campaign and told them I have a video that shows their candidate with his hands around an old guy’s neck. Would he like to explain?

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