Arizona Republicans have gone total MAGA with their 2022 midterms nominees, choosing far-right conspiracy theorists who include gubernatorial nominee Kari Lake and secretary of state nominee Mark Finchem — both of whom are supported by former President Donald Trump, and both of whom have promoted the false and thoroughly debunked claim that the United States' 2020 presidential election was stolen from Trump. Finchem's MAGA supporters include not only Trump, but also, "War Room" host and former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon and former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. And according to the Daily Beast's Sam Brodey, those MAGA Republicans are only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the type of conspiracy theorists the Finchem campaign has been associating with.
Finchem's far-right allies, according to Brodey, have ranged from QAnon supporters to Nicole Nogrady — a 39-year-old photographer, massage therapist and former actress who is big on "truther" conspiracy theories. Nogrady, Brodey reports, recently co-hosted a fundraiser for Arizona State Rep. Finchem in Newport Beach, California, and she is both a Sandy Hook "truther" and a 9/11 "truther."
"To her social media followers, Nogrady has shared QAnon content and broadcast her support for a number of fringe conspiracy theories," Brodey reports in an article published on September 20. "Just last week, Nogrady commemorated the anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks by claiming on social media that they were staged."
On the 21st anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., Nogrady posted, "The same people who orchestrated the event have been working hard behind the scenes to create their desired 'One World Gov't' and have made us divided more than EVER before." And she described 9/11 as "the day the Deep State took thousands of lives."
Nogrady has joined Infowars host Alex Jones in claiming that the massacre at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut was a "false flag" event and once posted on Facebook that "no one died" in that tragedy. And she said of the Sandy Hook families, "These families are all very much so $et for life both from deep state payouts and all of their Go Fund Me accounts. This is all a game to them and the public are the pawns."
Brodey reports, "Finchem's association with Nogrady is just the most recent illustration of his singularly conspiratorial campaign for a powerful office in a key battleground state. The Trump-endorsed state representative, who has a real chance of becoming Arizona's top election official, is perhaps more personally steeped in the right-wing fever swamps than any other high-profile Republican on the ballot. Last week, The Daily Beast reported that before his August primary, Finchem delivered a speech in which he blamed former Vice President Mike Pence for inciting a 'coup' to unseat Donald Trump after January 6 and accused him of being responsible for FBI spying on the ex-president's campaign in 2016. Finchem was present outside the Capitol after it was breached on January 6, according to video footage."
According to Brodey, Finchem's Newport Beach fundraiser also featured QAnon supporters, including conspiracy theorist Jordan Sather. Video of the event posted on Twitter by Media Matters' Alex Kaplan shows a woman performing a QAnon-themed song that included the QAnon slogan, "Where we go one, we go all."
Podcast host Travis View, who monitors QAnon, described Finchem as someone who has "zero qualms about associating with people who have some of the most out-there and vile views."
View told the Beast, "It's really, really disturbing. We've had QAnon candidates before…. It's rare to see one so open about it."
