Politics
Cochise County’s elections director resigns after protecting midterm ballots from Republican officials
During last fall’s fights in Cochise County over hand-counting ballots and rejecting the election results, county residents say they were glad there was one person standing up to defend elections. Elections Director Lisa Marra repeatedly explained — to the supervisors, to reporters, and, finally, to a judge — that she would not break the law […]
Joe Arpaio lost four elections and his coveted county sheriff job — but not his lasting influence
Street signs and a doormat posted outside former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s office refer to him as “Sheriff Joe.” He hasn’t held the position in six years, but he still sometimes slips into the present tense. “I am the sheriff for this county,” Arpaio said in an October interview, before switching back to speaking […]
Arizona Freedom Caucus plans to sue Hobbs over executive order protecting LGBTQ employees
The Arizona Freedom Caucus, an offshoot of the ultra-conservative Freedom Caucus in the U.S. House of Representatives, said Monday that it plans to sue Gov. Katie Hobbs for executive orders she issued in her first week on the job. Arizona Freedom Caucus Chairman and Queen Creek state Sen. Jake Hoffman accused Hobbs of attempting to […]
How the Jan. 6 insurrection led the GOP to its 2023 House speaker farce
When the attack on the Capitol happened two years ago, Americans watched with horror as the insurrectionists tried to stop Congress from certifying the results of the 2020 election. It was also a day that the Republicans set themselves up for not only their 2022 electoral shortcomings, but the coming chaos of the 2023 election […]
Rusty Bowers detailed Trump’s pressure campaign in private J6 Committee testimony
Mesa Republican and Arizona Speaker of the House Rusty Bowers detailed the pressure put on him by former President Donald Trump and his loyalists in an attempt to unconstitutionally change the state’s electors from Joe Biden in a newly released deposition transcript from the Congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection. “Rudy, you’re asking me […]
Mark Finchem talks about Ali Alexander, the Capitol attack and Trump ties in J6 deposition
Oro Valley Republican Mark Finchem has been publicly tight-lipped about his whereabouts on Jan. 6 and his connections to #StopTheSteal organizer Ali Alexander, but his testimony to the Congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection gives new insight into a man who has been instrumental in misinformation around Arizona’s electoral process. On Friday, the U.S. […]
Hating ourselves into paralysis
I think I know enough of hate To say that for destruction ice Is also great And would suffice. Robert Frost is on to something. His poem “Fire and Ice,” from which I’ve culled the lines above, contemplates the end of the world by ice: hatred. But how about a nation? Especially one whose self-proclaimed […]
As an independent, Kyrsten Sinema can play spoiler to Democrats. That’s assuming she runs at all.
Kyrsten Sinema made official today what has been obvious for a long time: She’s not a Democrat. The announcement is certainly not shocking — she ran in 2018 on her independent streak and has legislated that way — but it will have huge electoral ramifications if she chooses to run for reelection in 2024. Most […]
Former friends and foes unsurprised by Sinema’s defection from Democratic Party
Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema announced Friday morning that she was leaving the Democratic Party, a move that was not surprising to political observers and longtime former allies and foes of the senior senator who are now looking ahead to 2024. “Clearly, it gets her out of the worst place she could possibly be, which is […]
Kyrsten Sinema has left the Democratic Party, registered as an independent
Kyrsten Sinema, Arizona’s senior U.S. senator, has left the Democratic Party and re-registered as an independent. “Nothing will change about my values or my behavior,” she told Politico, which broke the news Friday morning. The first-term senator wrote in an opinion piece for the Arizona Republic that she does not intend to change the way she legislates […]
Future of U.S. election law at stake as Supreme Court hears North Carolina case
WASHINGTON — North Carolina Republicans appeared to have at least three of the U.S. Supreme Court’s conservative justices on their side Wednesday in a case that could determine the future of elections nationwide, and leave decisions about federal elections in the hands of state legislatures and beyond the reach of state courts. The Supreme Court […]
U.S. Supreme Court denies attempt by Arizona GOP chair Kelli Ward to block Jan. 6 panel subpoena
The U.S. Supreme Court sided Monday with the U.S. House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, denying a request from Arizona Republican Chairwoman Kelli Ward and her husband to block the panel from obtaining their cellphone records. The court’s two-paragraph order ends Kelli and Michael Ward’s federal suit to block the […]