Jorge Rivas, Tucson-area restaurant owner, is running for AZ governor

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The creator of the MAGA burger aims to become Arizona’s next Republican governor.

Jorge Rivas is a restaurant owner who has never held public office, but you may know his name. Rivas and his wife Betty were catapulted into the national spotlight after attending a Donald Trump rally last year, sparking a backlash with boycott threats.

Then Trump’s ringing endorsement on Twitter – “The food is great at Sammy’s Mexican Grill” – kicked off business at Rivas’ restaurant north of Tucson.

Rivas hopes Trump’s fame could help him again, this time to the governor’s office.

The entrepreneur and immigrant, who officially launched his campaign on Saturday, described himself as an outsider candidate free from political commitments.

“I want to do great things for the state,” he said. “I have the support of people who, once I’m elected, will not breathe my neck and ask, ‘Well, now you have to do this because we helped you.'”

Rivas said he will work to bring financial benefits to the state’s black and Latin American residents, saying they often feel left out by politicians. He said he would expand secondary education for children, including colleges and business schools.

“We need law and order in our society, we have to support our law enforcement,” said Rivas in a telephone interview on Tuesday. “Because if we have no law and no order, it means the bad guys will come in. The bad guys will take over.”

Rivas joins an already overcrowded field of candidates hoping for the Republican nomination 11 months before the primaries.

Kari Lake, a former Fox TV news anchor in Phoenix, and Steve Gaynor, a businessman, also face outsiders. Treasurer Kimberly Yee, former Congressman Matt Salmon, and former Regent Karrin Taylor Robson come to the race with backgrounds in politics and civil service.

Arizonans will elect their next governor in November 2022. Governor Doug Ducey, who was first elected in 2014, is temporary and leaves one vacant seat.

Rivas emigrated from El Salvador in the mid-1980s. He and his wife started their restaurant business in the mid-1990s and eventually built the current location in Catalina, north of Tucson. Both are longtime Trump supporters,and their menu includes a MAGA burger, a tribute to Trump’s 2016 campaign slogan, Make American Great Again.