Doug Ducey endorses the guy who said he betrayed the people of Arizona

Former Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey once famously silenced a call from then-President Donald Trump while certifying Arizona’s election results in 2020. But now, almost four years later, Ducey is finally picking up.

In a tweet on Tuesday, Ducey endorsed Trump and Republican U.S. Senate candidate Kari Lake, whose previous run for statewide office Ducey once said “is all an act.”

“Differences aside, there is too much on the line and only a Republican in the White House and a majority in the House and US Senate can ensure it,” Ducey wrote.

Those difference have been pretty big. Four years ago, Trump lobbied Ducey to overturn the 2020 election results in Arizona, where Joe Biden defeated the former president by about 11,000 votes. When Ducey wouldn’t do it, Trump said Ducey “betrayed the people of Arizona” by following the law and certifying the election.

Ducey’s endorsement of Lake is equally eye-popping. When Lake ran for governor as a Republican in 2022, Ducey endorsed her primary opponent and essentially called the newscaster-turned-MAGA fanatic “Fake Lake” on CNN.

“This is all an act,” Ducey added in that same CNN appearance. “She's been putting on a show for some time now, and we'll see if the voters of Arizona buy it.”

They didn’t then — nor are the courts — but apparently Ducey’s buying it now.

Unlike Ducey, moderate Republican politicians and politicos in Arizona have made recent news for endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris over Trump in the 2024 presidential election. Mesa Mayor John Giles spoke at a rally for Harris last week, while former Trump press secretary Stephanie Grisham and several former aides to the late Sen. John McCain have thrown their support behind the Democratic vice president.

Ducey’s endorsement of Lake also comes weeks after GOP megadonor Randy Kendrick, the wife of Arizona Diamondbacks owner Ken Kendrick, sent an email warning her inner circle that Lake “cannot win the general election” against Democratic candidate Rep. Ruben Gallego. She urged support in the Republican primary for Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb, whom Lake defeated with 55% of the vote.

This wouldn’t be the first time Ducey has flip-flopped on controversial matters. When the Arizona Supreme Court reinstated an 1864 near-total ban on abortion earlier this year, Ducey expressed disappointment that the ruling superseded the 15-week ban he signed into law in 2022. However, the bill Ducey signed clearly stated that the 1864 law took precedence over the newer ban.

Since June 2023, Ducey has been the CEO of a political action committee that claims the “core tenets of the free enterprise system are under attack,” which is not-so-subtle code for eliminating government regulations and government safety net programs that the PAC calls “big government socialism.”

Other mainstream Republicans may refuse to support antidemocracy grifters such as Trump and Lake, but Ducey knows that Democrats won’t be cutting corporate taxes or rolling back regulations that protect American citizens. After all, the former CEO of Cold Stone Creamery is a businessman. Once, he shunned the likes of openly authoritarian demagogues such as Trump and Lake.

Now, voting for them is just good business.