Blake Masters apparently never moved to the eighth congressional district after all, a fact that may have contributed to his primary loss.
Masters lives over 100 miles away in Tucson.
Tony Cani, a Phoenix-based public affairs strategist, was the one to point out that Masters hadn’t resided in CD8 by scrutinizing Masters’ ballot in a viral post on X.
Cani explained that he fact-checked his assessment by comparing a Maricopa County sample ballot against the Pima County sample ballot, and by looking up Masters’ voter file as well.
The eighth congressional district is within Maricopa County and includes Phoenix, Glendale, Peoria, Surprise, Sun City, Sun City West, Anthem, and New River. Outgoing Congresswoman Debbie Lesko resides in Peoria; she is running for the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors.
“Guess he never moved to CD8 after all,” posted Cani on X.
Blake Masters just tweeted this photo. It shows his ballot. Notice how it’s a Pima County Ballot. Guess he never moved to CD8 after all. pic.twitter.com/BD0WDwziya
— Tony Cani (@tcani) October 23, 2024
Congressional candidates aren’t required to live in the district they would represent, per the U.S. Constitution. They just have to be a resident of the state in which they’re running.
Candidates must also be at least 25 years old and a U.S. citizen.
The picture came from another post that same day, Wednesday, when Masters showed a picture of him holding his ballot — seated next to a smiling Sen. JD Vance, his endorser and running mate to presidential candidate Donald Trump — as a means of boosting GOP voter turnout. Trump endorsed both Hamadeh and Masters.
Arizonans: if you haven’t already, GO VOTE!!!
This is our last chance. Four more years of Kamala Harris would be game over for America as we’ve known it. Donald Trump and JD Vance will lead us back to prosperity. And if we do our jobs, they’ll win AZ handily.
But you know the… pic.twitter.com/I63Z6IwS9o
— Blake Masters (@bgmasters) October 23, 2024
Looking closely at a clearer version of the image posted by Masters, the candidates listed in the middle row indicate that the ballot is indeed a Pima County ballot.
Masters’ ballot reflects the same candidates as those listed for Pima County races: corporation commissioner, board of supervisors, county assessor, county attorney, county recorder, county sheriff, county superintendent of schools, county treasurer, and justice of the peace.
His ballot reflects that he resides in precinct 2 for the justice of the peace race, and district 2 for the board of supervisors race.
Sample ballots for Pima County are also available online for comparison.
Masters has lived in Tucson for years. He ran in, and lost, the 2022 Senate race against Democrat Mark Kelly.
Despite having less cash behind his race, GOP candidate Abe Hamadeh beat Masters in the primary with about 30 percent of votes ( four percent more than Masters, or over 4,200 votes more). House Speaker Ben Toma came in third with 21 percent of the vote (just under 21,600 votes).
These results occurred despite polling leading up to the election that predicted Masters would prevail over Hamadeh in a close race.
It’s so funny to see opponents pushing fake polls, as if they’re fooling anyone but themselves.
Here’s a *real* poll from July 11 by President Trump’s pollster. The truth is this race is close, and I’ve got the momentum. pic.twitter.com/w7HRRy9F4I
— Blake Masters (@bgmasters) July 20, 2024
Hamadeh raised over $1.7 million for his race, per FEC data, far less than Masters, who raised over $4.1 million.
The Democratic candidate for this race, Gregory Whitten, has raised just under $500,000. He ran uncontested in the Democratic primary and received just over 47,000 votes.
