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Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers could lose his number one Republican for a vacant Senate seat this week, after testifying before the Jan. 6 committee about the tense crusade by former President Donald Trump and his associates to nullify the effects of the state’s presidential election.
Bowers drew the ire of the Arizona Republican Party, which censured him earlier this month, and former President Trump. But he doesn’t do so because of his congressional testimony and his resolve not to overturn Arizona’s results.
“If we need to figure out a party and an authority and get other people to solve problems, it can’t be based on a lie. In the end, it falls apart,” he told “This Week” co-host Jonathan Karl in an exclusive interview. At his home in Mesa, Arizona.
Bowers faces Trump-approved candidate David Fansworth in a number one on Aug. 2 that makes Bowers the first Republican to take on the electorate after testifying before the Jan. 6 committee.
“Other people stood up and said, you know, just bloodless turkey, ‘I’m ashamed of you,'” he told Karl.
Bowers says he also called a “traitor” and said “the value of betrayal is suspended. “
In his June testimony, Bowers detailed several conversations with former President Trump and his private attorney at the time, Rudy Giuliani, asking him to update the Arizona electorate with those who would say Trump won the 2020 election.
Biden won Arizona in 2020 with nearly 11,000 votes.
“Have you ever accepted it?” Karl asked Bowers.
“I said, this is new to me. The concept of rejecting the election of the president is like, okay, so what Jupiter can I land on and colonize?”
Giuliani “never” provided evidence of claims that thousands of dead people voted in Arizona, Bowers said.
“Did you ask [Giuliani] about fraud?” Karl asked.
“Over and over again, and he said, ‘yes, yes. ‘And he gave us anything. No names, no data, nothing. “
Bowers, whose term is limited to the House of Representatives, has said in the past that it would take a “miracle” for him to win his state Senate nomination. He told Karl that “the demographics of my race are strongly Trump. “
In a move to run for state legislature, former President Trump campaigned in opposition to Bowers in Arizona.
“Rusty Bowers, he’s a RINO coward who participated against the Republican Party in the all-partisan committee of political thugs and hackers the other day, and dishonored himself, and dishonored the state of Arizona,” he told a crowd in Prescott Valley, Arizona, on July 22.
In response, Bowers told Karl, “I think someone was born as he was, was raised as he was; he has no idea how difficult a life is and what other people have to go through in the real world. “he has no idea what courage is, and the last position on Earth where he would need to do evil would be the state of Arizona. “
Bowers, a fifth-generation Arizonan, held public office for 17 years. Bowers, like other Republicans who broke with the former president, harassed and threatened.
“How do you know the control he has, though, over Republicans, adding a lot of Republican leaders here in Arizona?” asked Karl to Bowers.
“Well, those leaders in Arizona are an attractive organization in themselves. They rule through brutality and intimidation,” Bower said. Concern, demagogues like to use worry as a weapon. And they militarize everything. It’s not leadership for me to use violence. “
After his testimony, Bowers criticized for telling a reporter he would vote for President Trump in 2024. I told Karl that’s probably not the case.
“So, just to clarify, aren’t you Trump anymore?” Karl asked.
“I’m not,” Bowers said. My vote will tarnish his call on a ballot. “
“Will you vote for Donald Trump again?” reiterated Karl.
“I will never vote for him,” Bowers replied. But I may not have to, because I think America is tired. And there are other people who are surely energetic, qualified, morally, defensible, and upright. And that’s what I need in my party. And that’s what I need to see. “
Asked if former President Trump can be accepted as true in a position of authority, Bowers said, “In fact, I hope not. In fact, I don’t accept it as true with that authority I would exercise. “
Bowers echoed comments by House Committee Vice Chairwoman Liz Cheney, who is one of 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump after the riots on Capitol Hill.
“Liz also said that ‘the truth we face today as Republicans is that we have to decide whether to be unwavering with Donald Trump or to be true to the Constitution. ‘And you can’t be both,” Karl said.
“I don’t see any questions there. No questions. The Constitution is designed to last and be the gentleness of freedom for the world as a whole. It’s not a legacy I should play with,” Bowers said.
Bowers also told Karl that he had been contacted through the Justice Department, that it is conducting its own investigation into the Capitol Attack, but would cooperate if asked.
“I have nothing to hide and I’m going to tell the truth,” he said.
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