Over the last few months, an obscure conservative pundit and collectible knife maker with a history of making bigoted statements has interviewed some of the most prominent politicians in his home state of Arizona.
Greg Medford, founder of Medford Knife & Tool, hosts an obscure podcast and posts rants to YouTube, many of which contain racist and sexist remarks. Still, Arizona Republican candidates Blake Masters, running for Senate; Mark Finchem, running for secretary of State; and Abe Hamadeh, running for attorney general, have all appeared on his show since April.
In these appearances, each of these top political figures has made controversial comments. Masters appeared to endorse the racist great replacement theory, Finchem suggested listeners should read the extremist anti-abortion writer Matthew Trewhella, and Hamadeh made disparaging comments about Black communities. None had a critical word about Medford, and all were friendly with him over the course of the hour-plus-long interviews.
Medford styles himself a no-nonsense truth teller, and many of his videos are sophomoric attempts at being edgy and provocative. Sometimes, though, they cross over into explicit racism and sexism.
On February 25, Medford posted a straight-to-camera rant to YouTube making a nonsensical argument that women’s suffrage was responsible for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Medford weaved together a string of disparate topics, from the military draft to energy policy, crescendoing in a meltdown about Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), and, seemingly, Ilhan Omar (D-MN).
“Imagine a government that approves you to spend billions of dollars on a pipeline, and lets a stupid cunt fucking bartender from New York take away your license and 40,000 jobs and a nation’s energy independence,” Medford huffed. “Off the stupid fucking rantings of a fucking Marxist bartender and some goddamn immigrants who have somehow made it into the halls of power, selling women on this horseshit.”