Blake Masters, Disaster for Democracy, Wins Republican Nomination for Senate in Arizona

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The millennial millionaire won thanks to two anti-democratic billionaires.

Blake Masters, a far-right disciple of Silicon Valley titan Peter Thiel who has echoed the ideas of an “absolute monarchist,” mused about retiring all government employees, and campaigned as the Arizona avatar of Trumpist nativism—losing in the process the respect of the best man at his wedding, with whom he longer speaks—has won the nomination to be the Republican nominee for Senate in Arizona.

Masters beat a competitive five-person field on Tuesday. As with just about everything else in his professional life, the first-time candidate has Thiel to thank. The billionaire put at least $15 million behind the 35-year-old Masters—who was his chief of staff and the president of his charitable foundation until March—and proved essential to the Donald Trump endorsement that secured Masters’ victory.

Masters will face Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly, the astronaut and husband of former member of Congress Gabby Giffords, in what is expected to be one of the closest races of the year. If Masters loses, Democrats have a decent chance of holding the Senate. If he wins, Thiel could have two former employees in the Senate: Masters and J.D. Vance, the Hillbilly Elegy author and Ohio Senate candidate whom Thiel has spent another $15 million boosting. 

As I reported in a profile of Masters earlier this month, after spending much of his youth as a libertarian purist, Masters now positions himself as an America First ally of Tucker Carlson. Ever the venture capitalist, Masters sees the United States as another bloated company that could be turned around with the right investments. If the system most Americans call democracy ends up being disrupted in the process, that might just be the cost of doing business.

In practice, this has meant running a hard-right campaign that has attracted the support of run-of-the-mill Trump voters, outspoken white nationalists, and internet monarchists. After defending women’s right to choose for much of his life, Masters now calls abortion a “genocide.” Instead of calling illegal immigration “an ethical contradiction in terms” as he did in his anarcho-capitalist days, he put out a video reminiscent of The Camp of the Saints in which CGI migrants streamed through a gap in the border wall.

Old friends have been disgusted by his candidacy. “It makes me ache when I see what he writes and says,” says childhood friend Noah Gustafson. “It puts me in a state of depression.”

Collin Wedel, his best friend growing up and the best man at his wedding, remembers Masters as a Ron Paul superfan. These days, Masters admires Lee Kuan Yew, the dictator who transformed Singapore’s economy while also banning chewing gum. “It is shocking that he has moved to this sort of authoritarian, fascistic reverence for strongmen,” Wedel says.

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