Democratic U.S. Rep. Tom O’Halleran knows he could have just retired and ceded the sprawling Arizona district he was virtually certain to lose to the Republican who ended up defeating him.
But he said in a Friday interview with The Associated Press that he could do that because “that's not who I am.”
O'Halleran lost to former Navy Seal Eli Crane in the huge 2nd District that runs from northeastern Arizona to Tucson.
Redistricting made it heavily Republican and nearly unwinnable even for a moderate Democrat like O'Halleran who was well-known in the area.
Crane embraces former President Donald Trump's American First movement and says his election will help get the country back on track.