To memorialize Charlie Kirk, Rs wish to use public resources for partisan purposes

From KJZZ, written by Wayne Schutsky, dated 10/27 -

3 Arizona municipalities to consider moving forward with Charlie Kirk memorials

Several cities and towns across the Valley will consider requests to officially memorialize conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who was killed by a gunman last month.

Fountain Hills Vice Mayor Allen Skillicorn asked the council to consider building a statue to Kirk at a meeting last week. A similar effort backed by Skillicorn and Town Councilwoman Hannah Larrabee to rename the town’s community center after Kirk failed to gain traction last month, but this time the council agreed to consider Skillicorn’s request.

Mayor Gerry Friedel says the item likely won’t make it onto an agenda until next year due to a backlog of items the council needs to address at upcoming meetings.

The Scottsdale City Council will also discuss whether it wants to look into constructing a Kirk memorial at a meeting next week.

According to the agenda for the Nov. 3 meeting, the Scottsdale council can vote to add the item to an agenda for a future meeting or ask city staff to investigate the proposal further and deliver a report to the council.

The Phoenix City Council will consider a citizen petition at its meeting on Wednesday that asks it to rename a Seventh Street bridge near Chase Field after Kirk. The petition was filed by controversial activist the Rev. Jarrett Maupin.

This article was written before the Phoenix City Council considered, and rejected, Maupin's scheme.

The video of the 10/29 meeting is here.  The consideration of the Kirk petition begins at approximately the 45:51 mark of the video recording.

Two takeaways:

1.  The proposer of the petition, Republican gadfly Jarrett Maupin, didn't bother to show up and support his petition.  Not a good look for the erstwhile candidate for Congress.

2. The council denied the petition on a 7-1 vote.  The one supporter?  Republican former legislator Jim Waring.

The Scottsdale City Council will consider a memorial to Kirk on Monday, 11/3.

That one may pass without much comment - the proposal itself is limited (emphasis added by me), with them taking no public comments -

The scheme was proposed by Republican former legislator Adam Kwasman (notice a pattern?)

The Fountain Hills Town Council has not put the matter on a posted agenda as yet, but when it is, I expect the measure to pass.  The town is a R stronghold.

From Maricopa County Elections -

Let me be clear - I don't wish death on anyone, even someone like Kirk, who trafficked in and profited from hate.

The act of murder diminishes a society.

However, creating publicly-funded memorials and naming public infrastructure after murder victims is something that should be reserved for those who made a positive contribution to society, people whose loss diminishes society.

His spouse and offspring may find their lives are worse off without him; society is not.

Legislator wants to install speed inhibitor devices into the vehicles of speeders

Could someone please explain to me how devices installed into cars are less intrusive than traffic enforcement cameras, which Republican legislators absolutely *hate* (but never go into a vehicle)?

From Arizona Capitol Times , written by Jakob Thorington

Arizona to consider speed-limiting devices to improve road safety

An Arizona representative is trying to make the state’s roads safer by using new technology to tether excessive and frequent speeders to the posted speed limits. 

Rep. Quang Nguyen, R-Prescott Valley, said on Oct. 27 that he’s introducing a bill next session that would allow courts to order a speed-inhibitor device to be installed in the vehicles of motorists who frequently or excessively violate speeding laws. 

The "money line" in the article is the last one in the article...and the emphasis is on "money".

If the bill becomes law next session, Arizona would launch a competitive procurement process for companies to bid and become approved providers of devices that can be used.

 

Don't be shocked if the 2026 bill doing this is written in such a way that only one or two companies can meet the conditions that "approved" device providers will be required to meet.

An enterprising prosecutor could try to establish their professional bona fides by looking for financial ties between those companies and supporters of the measure.

During the 2025 session, Rep. Nguyen introduced HB2786, designed to mandate the installation of such devices.  It failed in the House.  Twice.

Actually, I think I know why Republican legislators hate traffic cameras so much.

They keep catching them doing bad things.

Legislative schedule - week starting 11/02/2025

Like last week, nothing is on the schedule...but two weeks from today, Republican Representative Alexander Kolodin will use his position to campaign for Arizona Secretary of State.

On the taxpayer dime.

Thank you, RFK Jr.: Measles comes to Arizona

Fortunately, thus far, it's limited to an enclave in the northern part of the state.

Of course, the airborne illness travels.

From the Arizona Department of Health Services -

[snip]

It's a national problem.

From the CDC -

From NBC News, dated 10/22 -

Measles spreading beyond the center of the Utah-Arizona outbreak

The nation's second-largest measles outbreak this year is spreading beyond its epicenter along the Utah-Arizona border.

Most of the known measles cases — 123 as of Wednesday — are linked to a tight-knit community of twin towns: Colorado City, in Mohave County, Arizona, and Hildale, which is in Washington County, Utah. Within the past few weeks, there have been three cases in nearby, larger towns, such as Hurricane and St. George, Utah. Those exposures occurred in hospital and urgent care settings, according to the Southwest Utah Public Health Department.

Independent voters in AZ want to watch their registrations

I watched KPNX's Sunday Square Off with Brahm Resnik today (I've said it before and I'll say it again - I'm a politics geek :) ).

Adrian Fontes, Arizona's Secretary of State was on.  At approximately the 5:30 mark of the linked YouTube video, he informed viewers that the state's No Labels party would be changing its name as of 12/1/2025.  

To "Arizona Independent" party.

As most registrants put "Independent" instead of "Party Not Declared" (PND) on their voter registration forms, this reeks of being a dirty trick intended to falsely inflate that party's registration numbers.

Fontes did report that he and staff are looking for ways to minimize confusion.

In spite of that, voters should check their registrations, especially PND voters.

What wasn't covered, and what I don't know, was if this is happening in other states, or if Arizona is serving as the guinea pig/test case for this scheme, and if it works here, it'll be exported to other states.

If this "No Labels" candidate is on a ballot, they'll probably get more votes than all other NL candidates COMBINED

From the Arizona Secretary of State's Statements of Interest page -

Legislative schedule - week starting 10/26/2025

Nothing scheduled this week.

That sound you hear is shoes dropping in multiple CDs

...Expect more "names" to enter these races (and more)...

- the former sheriff of Pinal County, Mark Lamb, has filed a Statement of Interest (SOI) with the AZSOS for a run at replacing Andy Biggs in CD5.

...as was widely expected, the current chair of the AZGOP, Gina Swoboda has throw her hat in the CD1 race to replace David Schweikert - she's formed a committee with the FEC -

Both Biggs and Schweikert are running for AZ Governor.

Arizona Mirror has stories up on Lamb and Swoboda.

Adelita Grijalva was elected nearly a month ago. Speaker Johnson still hasn't sworn her in. Maybe he should look in a mirror when assessing blame

Of course for that to help, he would have to cast a reflection.

He does a lot of blame-shifting, for, well, *lots* of things that he and his have done to the people of America.

Maybe, instead of blaming/ignoring adult women and boinking over the residents of AZ7 by leaving them without representation in the House of Representatives, he should point an accusatory finger at the guy he's trying to protect, Dear Leader, the one who (allegedly) likes to boink underaged girls.

From Politico via Yahoo! - 

Johnson refuses to swear in Grijalva, brushes aside Democrats' legal threat — for now

Speaker Mike Johnson is brushing off escalating threats of legal action from Democrats if Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva is not sworn in during Friday afternoon’s House pro forma session.

“It’s a publicity stunt by a Democrat Attorney General in Arizona who sees a national moment and wants to call me out,” Johnson told reporters Friday of the state's AG, Kris Mayes. “She has nothing whatsoever to do with what's happening in Congress."

His statement is is more than a little misleading - it's about what *not* happening in Congress, and when a part of Arizona is being victimized by malfeasance, even by a federal elected official, that is *always* something that is the business of the Arizona Attorney General, the chief protector of the people of AZ.

Mayes' press release on the topic is here.

Johnson, for his part believes that Grijalva should be working in her Congressional office without be a sworn and compensated member of Congress.

From Mediatite, via Yahoo! -

Like a ‘Car’ Without ‘Gas’: Rep-Elect Adelita Grijalva Shows Mike Johnson Why Her New Office is Inoperable

Representative-elect Adelita Grijalva (D-AZ) posted a video tour of her new office to show House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) why she can’t get down to business for her constituents.

Critics claim Johnson has been delaying Grijalva’s swearing in since she was elected nearly a month ago to fill her late-father’s congressional seat. Grijalva believes it’s because she has vowed she will be the 218th petition signer needed to get Congress to demand the Epstein files.

[snip, and emphasis added by me]

He then told CNBC, “In the meantime, she can be working for her constituents. She has hired staff. I’ve noticed they keep doing stunt videos outside of her office, knocking on the door and pretending it’s closed. It shouldn’t be. She should be in there taking calls from her constituents and doing her job.”

Perhaps he and the members of his caucus should be in non-functional offices taking calls from actual constituents instead of being on vacation to protect a pedophile.

Maybe they can do that while not receiving any compensation for their labors.

That'll both really drive home his point and be seen as leading by example.

I'm not gonna hold my breath waiting for that to happen.

Q3 Reports Are In! Redux

This covers covers state level candidates only, and then only those candidates that I've deemed as having a legit chance of winning their race or being "interesting". If a reader wants to know the numbers for a candidate not included here, please let me know in a comment.

David Schweikert is listed here, but he entered the Republican primary for AZ Governor outside of Q3, so he had nothing to report.  His Q4 fundraising should be illuminating.

Elijah Norton's (R - AZ Treasurer) robust COH number in spite of raising no funds in this quarter is due to a large loan he made to own campaign in a previous quarter.

Alexander Kolodin (R - AZ SOS) loaned his own campaign $52K during the quarter but paid back $2K during the quarter, so the debt is $50K.

[Edit on 10/19]

Mea Culpa - I made a typo on Rodney Glassman's COH number, as in "I forgot a digit".

His actual COH total is $2,826,323.83, not what I entered in my original post.

I apologize for the error; it was unintentional but regrettable.

[/end edit]

Q3 Reports Are In!

This covers covers Congress only, and then only those candidates that I've deemed as having a legit chance of winning their race or being "interesting". If a reader wants to know the numbers for a candidate not included here, please let me know in a comment.

David Schweikert (R-CD1) is included here because while he's declared for Arizona Governor, he was fundraising for his race to retain his seat in Congress well into the reporting period. While no Republican "names" have yet entered the race so far, I expect quarter's post to have different names on it.

Lastly, Adelita Grijalva (D-CD7) did not yet file a quarterly report for Q3; as such, her numbers are from her Pre-Special election filing covering the period through 9/3/2025.

Legislative schedule - week starting 10/19/2025

Rerun: Back to the normal intersession schedule at the Arizona Legislature - nothing is on the schedule this week.

Adelita Grijalva has learned that there are many things that an elected official has to deal with

Guessing that "moving goal posts" were never one of those things.

From Grijalva's campaign -

From CNN, dated 10/7 -

Speaker Johnson said he’d swear in new House Democrat 

‘as soon as she wants.’ Now Republicans are backtracking

Speaker Mike Johnson is not planning to allow Democrats’ newest congresswoman-elect to be sworn-in until her party agrees to end the government shutdown, despite telling CNN earlier Tuesday that he would swear her in “as soon as she wants.”

“We will swear in Rep.-Elect [Adelita] Grijalva as soon as the House returns to session when Chuck Schumer, Mark Kelly and Ruben Gallego decide to open up the government,” a leadership aide said Tuesday.

The move amounts to an extraordinary power play to deny a sitting member a seat.

Update: Johnson now intends to keep the House out of session for at least another week, thru 10/19.

Johnson seems to be auditioning for the title of "PedoProtector in Chief."

Pretty sure Pam Bondi has a lock on that one.

The at leaves "Assistant PedoProtector in Chief," but Kash Patel seems to have the edge there.

Evidently, that leaves "Deputy Assistant PedoProtector in Chief" as the highest title that Johnson can aspire to, and he's aspiring his ass off. 

Grijalva and the unrepresented people of AZ7 see to be collateral damage in his quest.

Ballots are in for the 11/4/2025 mail in election!

Found this in my mailbox on Friday -

First, the big one: Proposition 409.

It's a Maricopa County-wide ballot question about allowing the Special Healthcare District (aka - "Valleywise Health") to issue and sell $898M worth of bonds "to meet community need for healthcare facilities throughout Maricopa County."

The quote is from the publicity pamphlet for the question, a publication created to both inform voters that election is pending and the arguments for and against a particular proposition.

"For" arguments were submitted by folks from across the political spectrum; no "against" arguments were submitted.

The Phoenix Union High School District has two questions on the ballot, one for a budget increase and one for the continuation of a budget override.

The publicity pamphlet for those questions is here.

I'll be voting "Yes" on all of these.

I happen to think that a society whose members are healthy and educated is a strong society.  And while I truly believe these measures should be passed unanimously, I also understand that there are people who are opposed to anything that doesn't benefit them directly and immediately.

I'm not one of those people.

Legislative schedule - week starting 10/12/2025

Back to the normal intersession schedule at the Arizona Legislature - nothing is on the schedule this week.