The R disdain for society is not new; Cheeto just made it fashionable for his adherents

Matt Gaetz, Devin Nunes, Ted Cruz, and even Cheeto himself (and others) didn't invent Republican hatred of society; others did it before them.

In June of 2013, in a special session, the Arizona legislature voted to expand eligibility for AHCCCS, what Arizona calls Medicaid.  The vote was not unanimous (not hardly).

The special session bills were HB2010 and SB1009.  HB2010 was later substituted for SB1009 and the AZSenate ended up voting on HB2010.

Every member who voted against it didn't even pretend to represent their constituents (because it helped them) or even Arizonans as a whole (because the expansion benefited them, too), they just argued that "good Republicans" wouldn't vote for it.

In other words, the people opposed to the measure favored their party and ideology over the folks they (allegedly) worked for.

Some of the people are out of the legislature/politics; some are still there; others have moved on to other political positions - Kimberly Yee was the a state senator but is now the state's treasurer and is running for governor, Nancy Barto and Judy Burges are still in the legislature, Michele Reagan was a state senator but then be Arizona Secretary of State and now a Justice of the Peace in north Scottsdale; Kelli Ward was then a state senator and is now chairwoman of the Arizona Republican Party; Andy Biggs was then president of the AZSenate and is now a (presumed) treasonous member of Congress; Brenda Barton and Paul Boyer are still in the legislature; Karen Fann is now president of the AZSenate; David Gowan, David Livingston, and Rick Gray are still in the legislature; J.D. Mesnard and Warren Petersen are still in the legislature; Justin Olson was then a state representative and is now a member of the Arizona Corporation Commission; and Kelly Townsend and Michelle Ugenti (now Ugenti-Rita) are also still in the legislature.  Ugenti-Rita is now running for AZ Secretary of State.

Townsend and Ugenti-Rita famously dislike each other, but they are united in their dislike for Arizonans.

In case someone doesn't believe me, or are simply gluttons for punishment, video recordings of previous legislative meeting can be found here.

To watch these meetings, set the dropdown menu to 2013, 51st Legislature, 1st Special Session.

The highlighted vids are the relevant ones.

Michelle Reagan, Arizona Secretary of State or 21st Century "Not Ready For Prime Time Player"?

...Of course, unlike the real Not Ready For Prime Time Players, people are laughing at, not *with* her...

Arizona Secretary of State Michele Reagan, the state's chief elections officer, has had a tough few months.

First up: there were some massively long lines during Arizona's presidential primary in March.  Those lines were in Maricopa County, so the elections officer there (County Recorder Helen Purcell) took much of the heat for that, but some, inevitably, ended up on Reagan.

Then in May, in the weeks leading up to an incredibly close special election, her office failed to follow state law and send voter information pamphlets to hundreds of thousands of voters.

Now, this week, she is refusing to follow state law requiring her to issue updated manuals for election workers.

Now, I'm not going to pile on Secretary Reagan (well, not too much), but part of her job is to help people become voters.

She seems to be failing in that regard (as well as in the above areas) -

Phoenix ComicCon 2016, Friday night.  Pic courtesy Rebecca Wininger

And it isn't like she just plumb forgot about Phoenix ComicCon.  From Twitter -

That's not the only part of her job she's failing at (though elections are a *big* part of that job).

From the AZSOS' "Media Center" page -

Note the "@REALAZsos" Twitter handle; it doesn't match the "@SecretaryReagan" handle for the tweet above.

So I checked out the one linked on Reagan's official website.

Does anyone read Russian (at least, I think it's Russian)?

With polls, both formal and informal, it's all in how the questions are worded

In scientific polls, say, by a professional and unaffiliated pollster, the questions tend to be neutrally worded, to ensure that the responses are as informative as possible.

In less scientific polls, say, by a campaign or a pollster working for a campaign, the questions tend to be less neutral, either to garner a specific response or to test "messaging".

In unscientific polls, say, an online question, the questions tend to serve as clickbait or something designed to a specific response to support a specific argument.

Not surprisingly, anti-voter Arizona Secretary of State Michele Reagan seems to favor the latter, especially when looking to protect the corrupting influence of dark money from the disinfecting sunlight of disclosure.


Reagan is in a tizzy* over the moves of the voter-created Citizens Clean Elections Commission to update its rules regarding campaign finance disclosure, changes that would clarify that entities that are "created within the six months immediately preceding the beginning of a legislative election cycle or that is formed or created during the election cycle and knowingly makes expenditures or takes contributions of $500 or more for any election in this state in a calendar year..." as political committees subject to disclosure requirements.

* - Probably more "cold and calculating fury" than "tizzy", but I believe that the word tizzy isn't used enough these days, so "tizzy" it is. :)

To that end, she has published a "statement" criticizing the CCEC's "power grab".

At the end of that statement, she has appended a poll.

That question, coming at the end of her statement excoriating the CCEC, looks to be crafted to rouse the ire of "small government" partisans, the kind that voted for her for SOS last year.

Apparently, I am not one of her "kind of people" (the kind of partisans who voted for her).

So I voted "Yes" (of course :) ).

Apparently2, the majority of other people voting in this poll aren't exactly her kind of people, either.

After my vote, the following screen appeared -

Hmmm...

Probably not the sort of result that Reagan was looking for when she posted the poll.

On the other hand, she shouldn't be surprised - in scientific poll after scientific poll, the majority of Americans supports more oversight of campaign finance.

If, as I believe she has, she has aspirations to higher office (like the governor's office, which is both higher on the ballot and higher in the Executive Tower than her office), it might behoove her to take the poll results (both scientific and unscientific) into consideration before doubling down on her support of dark money and the anonymous purchase of elections and elected officials.

By the time the Doug Ducey era comes to a close, even the voters of Arizona may be tired of corruption in politics.

And its enablers.

More than one Reagan facing a primary in 2014

It's early yet, so things could change, but for some reason, one non-statewide race is already shaping up to have the most active primary, of the non-statewide races anyway.

In Maricopa County, some of the safest seats are among the lowest-profile seats - Justice of the Peace.

There are 26 of them, each with their own district (justice precincts), and other than one or two, all are "safe" districts, in partisan terms.

In many of the districts, the only real races are in the primaries, and often even those don't happen unless the seat up for election is vacant or the incumbent is an embarrassment (and given that the Arizona judiciary is actually pretty good at policing itself, the embarrassments are usually weeded out before their next election).

Which brings us to the McDowell Mountain Justice Precinct.  The JP there is Michael Reagan, the father of State Senator Michele Reagan (R-LD23), a 2014 candidate for Arizona Secretary of State.

He has filed to run for reelection, so the seat isn't "open", and while his politics are objectionable (hey, I'm a D :) ), his conduct in office has not been embarrassing, so far as I know, anyway.

Yet three (count 'em!) people have already signed up for a primary run at him -

Christina Weisman ($500 Threshold Committee)

Gayle Lee

Kathryn Shearer


On this one, I am genuinely curious. 

What's going on up there (north Scottsdale)?  Have some folks gotten the idea that Reagan isn't running for reelection, something that Reagan himself doesn't know about, since he has filed for reelection?  Is there something embarrassing about his conduct in office, something that apparently isn't widely known?  Is there just something in the water there?

The 2014 Republican Dream Team is assembling...

...well, "Dream" by my standards; probably not so much by the GOP's...

The Republican fields for the various statewide offices that are up for election next year are becoming clearer, to the point that in many of the races, there are favorites.

As in, candidates who people who are not Republicans hope emerge victorious in the Republican primary.

Under the theory that many of candidates have weaknesses that are so overwhelming that they should be easy to defeat in the general election.


...The team "Cap'n" of the Dream Team is, of course, candidate for governor "Atomic" Al Melvin.

Currently a state senator, he's part of the "Bay at the Moon" caucus at the state lege.  In fact he's one of the leaders.

When he isn't trying to turn Arizona into a nuclear waste dump or pushing to expand slave prison labor here, he is spouting off, like with his recent assertion that trees cause drought conditions.

He's looking to pull off the same play that the notorious Ev Mecham pulled off more than a quarter century ago.  If he does gain the office, he has the potential to embarrass and even damage the state even more than Mecham.  However, his presence at the top of the ticket will serve as an anchor on the rest of the ticket.


...The Dream Team's candidate for Cap'n in Waiting, aka "Secretary of State", is State Senator Michele Reagan.  She's nowhere near as colorful as Melvin.  Never a true "moderate", she was known as someone who would do the right thing for her district and state.  However, her political hard right turn over the last few years, perhaps in preparation for a statewide run, has her firmly ensconced in the heart (such as it is) of the Republican establishment.  Even though she is running for Secretary of State, the state's chief elections officer, she pushed nearly every anti-voter bill that was heard by the Arizona legislature this year.  The provisions of most of those bills were rolled into the blanket non-Republican voter suppression package known as HB2305.

However, none of the above is the reason she is on this list.

Nope.  It's simple statistics.

Over the past 20 years, literally dozens of sitting Republican legislators have sought higher office* while still in the lege.  Two have succeeded - Matt Salmon ran for Congress in 1994 and John Huppenthal ran for State Superintendent of Public Instruction in 2010.

And Salmon did it during a period that held the legislature in somewhat higher esteem than it is now.

To be sure, in AZ, many statewide and federal electeds are former legislators.  However, other than the two exceptions, all had at least one term away from the legislature before gaining the higher office.

* = Federal or statewide office.  County and municipal offices in AZ are steps up in esteem level (or at least reductions in notoriety level), but steps down in influence level.


...The Dream Team's candidate for enforcer, aka "Attorney General", is the incumbent, Tom Horne.

Possibly the weakest candidate of a weak bunch, an almost unheard-of description of an incumbent.

However, any state attorney general with a resume that includes a federal investigation over campaign finance violations, charges stemming from a hit-and-run accident while leaving a nooner at his girlfriend's home, and giving that girlfriend a highly-paid taxpayer-funded job probably should be looking for a new job.

However, Horne is looking for another term as AG.  It will be up to the voters to tell him that it's time to leave.

...The Dream Team's candidate for Mr. Moneybags, aka "State Treasurer", is Randy Pullen, former chair of the AZGOP and treasurer of the Republican National Committee.  On Thursday, he announced his "exploration" of a run for treasurer (source: Channel 12's Brahm Resnik).

A candidate for state treasurer who's known more for his divisiveness and his poor judgement (note: those are three sources that I never even imagined that I'd link to :) ) in handling others' money than for his financial acumen?

That would be a gift...to whoever else is on the ballot for that office.


...The Dream Team's candidate for Minister of Propaganda, aka "Superintendent of Public Instruction", is the incumbent, John Huppenthal.

Hates public education in a state where the vast majority of parents can't afford private schools and he hates Hispanic people in a state where the Hispanic population is growing both in size and political influence.

That combination is more ripe for a political Darwin award than it is for re-election.


...Note: I am not including the office of State Mine Inspector because it is too low-profile.  Most people in AZ don't know the office exists; most that do cannot name the officeholder.  Perhaps at the founding of AZ, it was a necessary position, but these days it just a place for former rural legislators to pad their pensions and a chance to hobknob with mining industry lobbyists.


Predictions: If the Rs were to nominate this slate, I would be very happy...and very surprised.

...Melvin doesn't seem likely to emerge from the primary, but neither did Ev Mecham in 1986.  At least by the standards of the AZGOP,  being "bay at the moon crazy" doesn't disqualify someone from being their candidate.

...Reagan is the "establishment" candidate, in a party that is being wracked by paroxysms of anti-"establishment" fervor.  Probably the favorite, for now, but not a prohibitive one.

...Horne should be toast.  Someone who's even a little more polished should have little trouble dispatching him in the primary.  If no one does, however, Felecia Rotellini, the presumptive Democratic nominee for the job, will thoroughly kick his ass in the general election.  Which is the main reason that Horne will face a primary challenger.

...Pullen may very well win the nomination, but he has so many enemies within the AZGOP that it won't be easy for him.

...Huppenthal, well, many people (me among them), have written his political epitaph before.  And we've been wrong each time.  He is utterly unqualified for elected office or any position of public trust.  Having said that, no smack talk until it's proven that he can be defeated.

Republicans and voting "reform": Even when they are trying to be subtle, they're like an elephant in a china shop

During the 2012 election cycle, there were many Republican-initiated moves across the country intended to inhibit or even block voting by groups that tend to not vote for them.

For example, here in Arizona we saw the Maricopa County Elections Department tell Spanish-speaking voters the wrong day for Election Day, the same elections department under-train staff and under-supply polling places in Democratic-leaning areas, leading to ballot shortages and long lines on Election Day, and a suspiciously interminable vote-counting process after the election.

The efforts brought forth a mixed bag of results.

Nationally, Barack Obama won reelection as President, and the number of Democrats in the US Senate surprisingly increased, while the Republicans retained a comfortable majority in the US House.

Locally, Democratic candidates won all three competitive Congressional seats here, and made small gains in the Arizona legislature, while the Republicans now control all statewide elected offices and Maricopa County Sheriff Joe "Bull Connor Jr." Arpaio won reelection comfortably.

Because of the lessons from the 2012 election cycle is that Republicans across the country are attempting to make systemic changes, to impose rule changes at local and state levels, to "stack the deck" in favor of Republican candidates.

In many of the states that tend to vote for Democrats in presidential elections but whose state governments are dominated by Republican, proposals to change the way electoral votes are allocated.  Instead of the current "winner take all" system, they want to change to a system where electoral votes are split between the major candidates, based on things like percentage of the popular vote or by congressional district.  However, no such proposals have been put forth in states that tend to favor Republican presidential candidates.

In other states with state governments dominated by Republicans, they've seen proposals to restrict voting by groups that tend to favor Democrats, all in the name of "reform"..

None of the schemes qualify as "subtle", and all of them have justifiably caused an uproar wherever they've be put forth.

Here in AZ, the Republicans have seemed to learn a bit of a lesson from all of that.

They're still trying to "stack the deck" here, so national Republicans should have no worries about backsliding on the part of the AZGOP.

They're mostly trying to be a little sneaky, even delicate, about it.

Of course, being who they are, their efforts are as sneaky and delicate as an elephant in the proverbial china shop.

Sen. Michelle Reagan (R-Scottsdale), an erstwhile 2014 candidate for AZ Secretary of State, is chair of the state senate's Elections Committee, and she is leading the way on this.  Many of the proposals under consideration here may not have her name on them, but she determines which of them move forward.

One of her own measures, SB1260, has already moved through her committee, passing unanimously.  It raises some of the adminstrative hurdles that have to be surmounted by people attempting to put a referendum or initiative question on the ballot.  However, the changes aren't huge ones, and some of them are (dare I say it?) reasonable.  Hence, its unanimous committee support.

Less reasonable is her SB1262, which seems to make "minor" changes to campaign finance law regarding recall elections.  It seeks to impose standard campaign finance restrictions on committees and contributors involved in the recall effort before the recall election is officially called (basically, while petitions are being circulated and haven't been submitted and certified).  In an of itself, that's not unreasonable - candidates for office face those limits even before they submit their own petitions.

However, that unfairly tilts the balance toward the elected officials who are the subject of recall campaigns.  The official who is the subject of a recall campaign is automatically on the ballot, so he/she does not have to incur expenses (or solicit contributions to pay for those expenses) before the recall election is scheduled.  The people who support the recall face a campaign limits clock that starts months before that date.  SB1262 has been agendized for the February 19 meeting of Senate Elections.

Also with some superficial merit is her SCR1006.  As written and if approved by the voters, it would amend the AZ Constitution to change the deadline for submitting petitions for ballot questions from four months prior to the election where the question will be on the ballot (for the vast majority of questions, this means the first Tuesday in July) to May 1.  In and of itself, that isn't a bad idea - for ballot questions, there are tens of thousands of pages with hundreds of thousands of signatures to go through and verify, and that's a heavy burden to bear for the professional staffs in the offices of the AZ SOS and AZ's county recorders.  However, while the bill rolls back the deadline to submit petitions, it doesn't similarly roll back the earliest date when signatures can start being collected for ballot questions (24 months before the measure is to be voted on).  In addition, Sen. Steve Gallardo (D-Phoenix) proposed an amendment to the measure which would have slightly reduced the number of signatures required for ballot questions, something that would both address easing the burden on the SOS and county recorders and the reduced time available to collect signatures.  However, when this bill was considered by Reagan's committee, she didn't just oppose the amendment, she used her position as chair to make sure that the amendment wasn't even considered.  Passed by the committee on a 5 - 2 vote. 

Note to readers:  Don't consider the presence of a Democrat on a bill's list of sponsors to be a sign that the bill may be a good one.  Sen. Robert Meza (D-Phoenix) has signed on to a number of these bills.  They're still crap.

And with a veneer of merit that's measured in microns (millionths of a meter):  Reagan's SB1416 and SCR1019.  Those are related measures that would require that signatures needed for proposed ballot questions and by new parties seeking direct ballot access be collected from at least five counties (not unreasonable) and that at least forty percent of the signatures be collected from counties other than Pima and Maricopa.  Both measures are agendized for the February 19 meeting of Senate Elections.

Which doesn't sound too bad, until you think on it for oh, about a tenth of a second, and remember that 75% of the state's population is in those two counties, as are more than 74% of the state's registered voters.

In addition to placing a statistical overemphasis on rural voters for the purpose of gaining access to the ballot for potential ballot question and new parties, her measures would elevate the financial and logistical hurdles for the folks behind ballot questions/new parties.

That all pales next to her striker, or strike-everything amendment, to SB1003 that seeks to make returning an early ballot by someone who is not an immediate family member a felony.  This directly attacks the many Democratic-supporting campaigns and organizations who do just that as part of their "get out the vote" efforts.

The amended SB1003 passed Senate Elections on a party-line vote.

Tom Prezelski (Tomski?) of Rum, Romanism and Rebellion offers his take on Reagan's efforts to "reform" voting and elections here.

Steve Muratore of Arizona Eagletarian has more info on developments related to some of the bills mentioned in this post here.

Julie Erfle of Politics Uncuffed offers her observations on one of Reagan's measures here.


And Reagan is one of the more "reasonable" and "professional" members of the Republican caucus of the legislature.

By comparison, Rep. Jeff Dial (R-Chandler) has proposed HB2568.  His measure starts off by changing the nominating signature requirements for candidates in a way that favors Republicans statewide, and favors majority party candidates in districts dominated by a single party.  Under current law, the number of signatures required for a candidate to be nominated to a party's primary ballot is based on a percentage of the relevant party's registered voters in the area to be represented by the office up for election.  He proposes to cut the required percentage to one-third of the current level, but to increase the "denominator" of the equation by approximately three times by making the total number of voters in the district the base.

For example, if under current law, if a candidate of party X is running in a district with 10,000 voters, 3000 of whom are registered in party X needs signatures from 1% of his party's voters to get on the ballot, 30 signatures would be needed.  Under Dial's proposal, he'd need 1/3 of 1% of 10,000, or 33, signatures.

In an example where the district has 10,000 voters and party X has 5000 registrants, the required number of signatures would go from 50 down to 33.

Statewide, partisan registration percentages are approximately 36% Republican, 30% Democratic, 0.16% Green, and 0.73% Libertarian.

In short, Dial's scheme would make it easier for Republicans statewide and in most legislative and Congressional districts to get on the ballot and, except for the few Democratic-dominated districts, more difficult for Democrats to get on the ballot.  On the other hand, Greens and Libertarians would be completely blocked from ballot access.  Partisan nominating petitions must be signed by members of the relevant political party, and Dial's proposal would raise their signature requirements to a number greater than the number of members of those parties.

And that is the "less bad" part of Dial's proposal.

Part of his proposal would mandate removal from the permanent early voters list (PEVL) anyone who lives in a home whose ownership is transferred by a "trustee's deed of sale" (aka - foreclosed).  People who haven't moved as a result of the foreclosure would be forced to re-register to vote and ask for an early ballot twice before before they could receive a ballot.

HB2568 was held by the House Judiciary Committee during its February 14 meeting.

Of course, it's not just Reagan and Dial -

- Rep. Michelle Ugenti (R-Scottsdale) has HB2527.  Current law covering polling places allows electioneering activities outside of a 75-foot buffer zone outside the actual area where voting takes place.  The same law allows for certain exceptions where "emergency conditions" exist that make electioneering problematical.  The exceptions tend to be school facilities.  Ugenti's proposal would remove the part of the law that allow for exemptions to the electioneering allowance, meaning that the buildings would have to allow electioneering, or not serve as polling places.

A bad bill, but it shows a sort of subtlety for which AZ Republicans aren't known.

Passed by the House Judiciary Committee by a party-line vote.  Next up:  House Government.

- Sen. Chester Crandell (R-LD6 ) has SB1274.  Currently, early ballots can be returned by mail at any time, so long as they are received by the county elections department by the time polls close on Election Day (7 p.m.) or they can be dropped off at any polling place in the county on Election Day.  Crandell's proposal would remove the ability of voters with early ballots to drop them off at a polling place.  In addition, the ballots would have to be received by the Elections Department by 7 p.m. on the Tuesday the week BEFORE the election. 

Agendized for the February 19 meeting of Senate Elections.

- Rep Carl Seel (R-Birtherland) has HB2350.  Currently, a voter who want to be on the PEVL or simply to receive an early ballot for a single election simply complete and sign the appropriate request form.  Seel's proposal would raise the hurdle that voters need to climb over by requiring that signatures on such forms be notarized first.  In addition, any people who are currently on the PEVL would be removed from the list if they don't send in a notarized request form within two election cycles (four years).

- Seel also has HCR2013.  Currently, the state constitution mandates that a primary election be held for most elected offices.  Seel's proposal would change that to allow closed party caucuses to nominate candidates to the general election ballot.  "Closed" means "no independents allowed".

- Rep. David Stevens (R-Sierra Vista) has HCR2008.  Currently, the state constitution mandates that elections for most offices be held on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November.  Stevens' proposal would amend the state constitution to mandate that "a candidate who wins the primary election for that office and who has no write-in or other opposition for that office at the general election shall be deemed and declared the winner of the general election."END_STATUTE""

The change would not apply to candidates for federal office.  However, it is written so broadly and vaguely that a shamelessly partisan/enthusiastically efficient election official (your choice about which term you prefer) would have cover for bypassing the election and simply declaring a favored candidate the winner.


Many, even most, of these measures won't pass...initially.  However, until the legislative session is over, the language from any of these bills can be air-dropped into another bill in the form of a striker at any time.  This is a situation that requires ongoing vigilance.

And active memories. 

All of the people who are pushing the above "reforms" will be going before the voters in 2014; that offers a perfect opportunity to advise them of the error of their ways.