Arizona Republican-turned-independent hopes to oust conservative stalwart
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From left, U.S. Rep. Andy Biggs and challengers Clint Smith and Javier Garcia Ramos. Photos: Courtesy of the Biggs, Smith and Ramos campaigns. Illustration: Brendan Lynch/Axios
An East Valley attorney who officially left the GOP last year after decades of estrangement is hoping he's found the key to unseating Republican Congressman Andy Biggs: challenging him as an independent.
Driving the news: Clint Smith describes himself as a lifelong conservative who had been drifting away from the GOP since the 1990s.
- Smith, a Mesa resident who owns a law practice in Scottsdale, said the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol last year was the final straw that led him to register as an independent.
Context: Biggs and Smith are running in the East Valley-based 5th Congressional District, where Republicans outnumber Democrats nearly 2-to-1.
- However, Smith is hoping to win the votes of enough independents and Democrats, along with some disgruntled Republicans, to defeat Biggs.
Yes, but: Smith will have to contend for those votes with an actual Democratic candidate — Javier Garcia Ramos, who serves as senior counsel for the Gila River Indian Community.
Details: Smith has some traditionally conservative positions, such as support for law enforcement, free-market economics and opposition to government regulations.
The intrigue: He also has a number of positions that are more closely identified with Democrats.
- He tells Axios that he wants both a secure border and reforms that would grant a path to legal residency for immigrants who have lived in the U.S. for most of their lives.
- Smith also supports some gun-control proposals such as red flag laws, raising the minimum age to purchase some firearms and mandatory background checks.
- On abortion, he says "government should stay the heck out of a woman's relationship with her doctor."
Between the lines: Smith says he was recruited into the race by former state Sen. Jerry Lewis, who ousted then-Senate President Russell Pearce in a historic recall election in 2011.
What he's saying: Smith said Biggs bears responsibility for "the whole motion that got us" to the Jan. 6 attack: "The whole plan to steal the election, the insurrection, the idea of fake electors, refusing to recognize Capitol Police."
- "But beyond that, we have a guy who basically says 'no' to just about everything, and including things like the formula for needy families, [and] now wants to defund the FBI and the DOJ."
The other side: Biggs tells Axios that his views are more in line with the district and with the country as a whole than Smith's and that Smith would acquiesce to President Biden's agenda if he were elected.
- He describes Smith as weak on the Second Amendment and on border security.
- "The bottom line is he left the Republican Party a long, long time ago," Biggs says of Smith.
Worth noting: Biggs denied allegations that he was involved with the rally that preceded the Jan. 6 attack.
- "The reality is nobody condones what happened on Jan. 6, and that was not good. I said that day that was not good for the conservative movement," he tells Axios.
- He says he voted against certification of Arizona's Biden electors due to a judge's ruling, which was later reversed, that allowed thousands of people to register to vote here after the statutory deadline.
1 other thing: While Smith and supporters view Garcia Ramos as a spoiler, the Democratic nominee defended his campaign, noting that this is his second run for the seat and pointing out that he launched his 2022 campaign before Smith did.
- Garcia Ramos' war chest consists of $4,200 he put into the race. He says he refuses to accept campaign contributions because, "I want to uplift individuals who don't have a voice in their government. I want to give the office back to the people."
- He says he would never abandon his Democratic principles by dropping out of the race to help Smith.