AZ GOP Treasurer Race Heats as Norton, Haley Punch Harder

Arizona’s treasurer race is heating up, with Republican candidates Elijah Norton and Katherine Haley trading increasingly personal barbs just days before the state primary.

Over the last 24 hours, both candidates for the state’s chief financial officer have traded flak on social media. Haley, a small business owner and the president of the Arizona State Board of Education, publicly shared a video calling out Norton’s business practices, legal claims, and personal purchases, with only a single-sentence disclaimer: “You deserve a treasurer you can trust.”

Norton, a self-made business owner in the insurance industry, followed up with his own similar post just half a day later.

“People lie in campaigns when they become desperate. Our campaign is focused on the positive messaging – that we need a real conservative business leader to help safely increase returns and make money for the Arizona taxpayer – and also stop waste, fraud, and abuse,” Norton wrote on his campaign page.

While the criticism spurred rumors that Norton was considering taking the campaign fight to court, he did not confirm plans for legal action against Haley’s campaign now or in the near future.

“I’m focused on winning, I’m beating Katherine by 20 points, her campaign is not resonating with the voters,” Norton told the Arizona Globe. “There’s a clear contrast between mine and her campaign. My campaign feels the treasurer should be active, going into the office every day, leading a team of investment professionals. Her team believes a team of unelected bureaucrats should be running the office.”

Kim Owens, a campaign spokesperson for Haley, defended the social media posts against accusations that they were personal attacks.

“We’ve only put facts out there, and they’re facts about his temperament and his judgment,” Owens said. “Facts that we think people should consider if they want to choose a candidate who is electable in November.”

The two last debated on May 19, 2026, during Arizona PBS’s “Candidates in Conversation” series, in which both raised similar challenges to each other’s experience and qualifications. The state treasurer is the chief banker and investment officer for the state and, as such, manages the state’s cash flow, invests taxpayer dollars for state profit, and audits the state’s accounting systems.

Norton, leveraging that fact, pushed voters to consider Haley’s actual accounting experience during the debate. “She’s not qualified, frankly, and I mean this with all due respect, to be the bookkeeper at a pizza parlor (let alone) manage $32 billion,” Norton said.

That criticism quickly led Haley to call out Norton during the debate, arguing that Norton would “make risky bets” on state investments and sell “our portfolio to the highest bidder.”

A recent flash poll from NextGenP shows Norton with a 23-point lead over Haley, and future market gamblers on Kalshi are placing 94% of over $12,000 in bets on Norton to take the primary on Tuesday.

Despite the odds, Haley’s campaign is pushing voters to look beyond the primary to the candidate they think can win the general election.

“We need a candidate that can win the general,” Owens said. “Which Republican will stand the test of who do you trust in the general election? Because general voters aren’t going to care about much money Elijah Norton gave to the Republican party, they are going to care about who’s going to protect their investment.”

Whether that theory proves true will be determined this upcoming Tuesday, July 21, 2026, when Republican voters across the state vote on their pick for the November ballot.