Five Republicans will meet July 30 in the Arizona House of Representatives primary for Legislative District 14.
Two will emerge for the Nov. 5 general election, but when they get there, they will not see any opposition from the Democratic Party. No Democrat filed to run.
Incumbent Laurin Hendrix has filed to run for reelection, but Rep. Travis Grantham has reached his term limit and will not be running again.
Here are the candidates' biographies:
Joel Coen
Joel Coen, a Republican, serves as president of TruNorth Advisors. His background is as a business executive.
Coen is a first-generation American. His grandfather went from being a coal-miner to being an electrician.
Coen studied business at Colorado State University and Regis University.
He volunteers as president of the Phoenix Men’s Art Council. He formerly was a coordinator for the SEAKR Foundation, which brings initial public awareness to the plight of soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan.
Laurin Hendrix
Laurin Hendrix is an incumbent member of the Arizona House of Representatives and a member of the Republican Party.
Hendrix was elected in 2022 after serving two years on Gilbert Town Council. He previously served one term in the House in 2009-10 but was defeated for re-election. He also served as a member and president of the Maricopa County Community College District board.
Hendrix was born in California and earned a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry from the University of California.
He is owner of a number of small businesses and a real-estate broker.
Lalani Hunsaker
Republican Lalani Hunsaker is a wife, a mother to four, business owner, school choice advocate, charter school board member, and former school principal.
Hunsaker serves as director of government relations for Charter One, a charter-school management and support company.
Hunsaker and her husband Nate have raised their family in Gilbert for more than 19 years.
Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson has been married to his wife Barbara for 42 years, with three adult children and seven grandchildren. He has lived in Gilbert for nearly 30 years and is an active precinct and state committeeman for Republican Legislative District 14.
Jackson served 22 years as a senior pastoral-leader in two large churches, including Word of Grace Church in Mesa. He was also an adjunct professor at Chandler Gilbert and Mesa community colleges.
Jackson earned three accredited degrees from Northwest University (bachelor of arts), Fuller Theological Seminary (master of divinity), and Gordan-Conwell Theological Seminar (doctorate). He studied for one year at the Jerusalem University College in Jerusalem.
Now that he is semi-retired, he leads annual biblical tours in Israel and Turkey.
Khyl Powell
Republican Khyl Powell has lived in Arizona the majority of his life while living in Gilbert for more than 25 years.
He is a former employee of the Phoenix Police Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He also has served as the president and owner of a multimillion-dollar service company for 24 years.
Powell has owned and managed an industrial real estate development company in Gilbert for 20 years. He served on the Planning Commission for the town of Gilbert and on the Small Business Alliance board lobbying the town for small businesses. He served as a local precinct committeeman and helped with the 2020 elections.
Powell has been married for more than 48 years and has three children and 11 grandchildren.
Tom Blodgett
Gilbert News Editor | Gilbert
tblodgett@iniusa.org
Raised in Arizona, Tom Blodgett has spent more than 35 years in journalism in Arizona and joined Independent Newsmedia in July 2022 to launch the Gilbert edition. He is a graduate of Arizona State University, where he served as an instructional professional in the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication from 2005-19 and remains editorial adviser to The State Press, the university's independent student media outlet.
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