Is it still a debate if the governor is too scared to show up?

Arizonans rarely have the chance to look their elected officials in the eye and tell them exactly what they think. On Tuesday night, a third-party candidate for Arizona governor took full advantage of that opportunity. Katie Hobbs, inexplicably, didn’t avail herself of that same opportunity.

With the absence of Democrat incumbent Gov. Katie Hobbs on the debate stage, Arizona’s gubernatorial debate shaped up to be a one-on-one contest between Hobbs’ MAGA challenger, Republican Rep. Andy Biggs, and No Labels candidate Teri Hourihan. Risa Lombardo, the Green Party candidate, couldn’t attend at the last minute. 

Based on mid-Hulu-binge TV ads, the race is shaping up to be a contest of Biggs chasing Hobbs until Election Day on November 3. A Noble Predictive Insights poll from late August shows Hobbs leading Biggs with 48% of the vote, compared to his 35%. The prediction market Kalshi shows Hobbs with an even larger lead, forecasting an 87% probability that Hobbs would secure a second term. 

But technically, other players are in the race. During the awkward, clunky snore-fest of a debate, the one our current governor elected to not attend, Hourihan sought to remind Biggs of that.

Hourihan seized the opportunity to rip into current leadership in her opening statement. She said she’s “never seen Arizona so bad.” She blamed the political class, including Biggs and Hobbs, before going on to question Biggs on the Epstein Files. Throughout the evening, she continued to make her frustrations with Biggs known. 

Biggs directed his criticisms at his absent opponent, the governor, who deliberately didn’t show up to defend herself and her first four years in office. He accused Hobbs of “hiding” from voters by refusing to join them on the debate stage. He said her administration’s failure to file audits threatened Arizona’s Medicaid funding. He criticized her election and education policy decisions. 

Then the moderators asked Hourihan a question. Instead of directly answering, she took the opportunity to criticize Biggs for having Turning Point USA as one of his largest donors. She called Biggs “one of the most dangerous people” on healthcare and said he’s the “person I would least trust to protect our borders” because of his policy decisions to decertify the police force in Colorado City. 

That dig at Biggs really fired him up. He called her comments “outrageous lies.” He was “baffled” that someone with “such little knowledge of either the legislative process or even water policy in this state would have the temerity to stand here and berate me and assault my character,” he said.

“I am a constituent of yours,” Hourihan responded later in the debate, avoiding a question about mail-in voting. “And that’s what you think of me, and that’s what you think of any constituent who asks you questions.” 

In his closing statements, Biggs dismissed Hourihan. He called Hobbs “the one I consider my opponent.” Hourihan reminded him that she was his opponent, too.

“I realize you want to ignore me and pretend that I don’t exist,” she said. “But I do.” 

Despite a feisty performance, there’s no shot in hell that Hourihan becomes Arizona’s next governor. She had plenty of sharp criticisms of Biggs during the debate, but when asked if she’d have to choose Biggs or Hobbs, she declined to answer. She characterized them as a “double-edged sword.” Between Hobbs’s “silence” and Biggs’s hostility to healthcare and ties to Turning Point, she said she couldn’t vote for either. 

“They’re both dangerous for Arizona,” she said.