Thomas announces resignation...

...of course, he made the announcement that he will resign to run for Arizona Attorney General on April 6 (next Tuesday) on April Fool's Day, so take it with a grain of salt.

...of course2, if he actually wins the AG race, we will be the victims of the biggest April Fool's joke ever...

From AZCentral.com -

Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas announced Thursday that he would resign effective Tuesday to run for Arizona Attorney General.

Thomas is withholding comment on his resignation until Friday. His staff learned of his resignation at a 2 p.m. briefing.

Possible candidates to replace Thomas include: Boyd Dunn, Mayor of Chandler; Jay Beckstead, a former prosecutor in Maricopa and Yavapai counties; Bill Montgomery*, a current Maricopa County prosecutor and former R nominee for AZAG (2006). All three are Republicans. There may be others (Rick Romley?) lobbying more quietly for the job.

Normally, that would be the end of it - the Board of Supervisors gets to appoint a replacement CA to serve until a new one can be elected in November. However, Thomas is trying to do an end run around them by convincing Jan Brewer to appoint one.

Either way, though, there will be a race for Maricopa County Attorney on November's ballot. When a Democrat (or Democrats) announces for the race, I'll update on this blog.

* - In 2006, Montgomery wanted to shore up his anti-immigrant bonafides, so to show how much he was opposed to undocumented immigrants from Mexico coming to the US to find work, he hired undocumented immigrants from Mexico to appear in his campaign spot. Oops.

From a joint statement on Thomas' impending resignation issued by Felecia Rotellini, David Lujan, and Vince Rabago, the three Democratic candidates for AZ Attorney General (via email) -

"It's rather fitting this was announced on April Fool's Day. After forcing Arizonans to endure his costly and ethically bankrupt legal battle with county officials, Andrew Thomas now has the nerve to ask voters for a promotion. He talks as if he's tough on crime, but his actions reveal a politician who cares more about pursuing his own political vendettas than about keeping our streets safe from violent criminals. Arizonans want their law-enforcement officials to spend tax dollars wisely and keep criminals off our streets. Andrew Thomas has failed on both counts."

Later...