Checking the facts in the Arizona Senate race

Sen. John McCain, the Republican Party’s most recent nominee for president, is facing a serious re-election challenge from within his own party.

McCain is being challenged by former U.S. Rep. J.D. Hayworth. For our Message Machine partnership with NPR, we checked claims from two ads, one from each:

McCain, invoking a line we’ve heard in many other races, slammed Hayworth for being a lobbyist. We checked the facts and found McCain was right.

Hayworth, meanwhile, is portraying McCain as out-of-step with conservative Arizona values. He says McCain voted against the Bush tax cuts because he “wrongly” calimed they helped only the rich. We rated that one Mostly True.