After being kicked off the ballot in 2022 and forced to withdraw his candidacy in 2024, Republican Neil DeSanti took several steps to prepare for his fifth run for public office this year in the competitive Legislative District 2.
He asked Maricopa County Superior Court to set aside his two felony convictions.
He asked for his criminal file to be sealed.
And he asked to have his civil rights restored.
While a Maricopa County judge restored DeSanti’s civil rights in a felony drunken-driving case from 2005, she denied his application to restore them in a 2010 case in which he pleaded guilty to a felony related to a burglary.
Judge Christina Henderson said the denial was based on DeSanti still owing probation fees and that he committed a “victim crime” while on release from the drunken-driving case.
“Denial is in best interest of public safety,” Henderson wrote on July 23, 2024.
Neil DeSanti collecting signatures from voters to qualify for the ballot
DeSanti said his rights have been restored.
“You have false information,” DeSanti said in a short interview on Monday.
Karla Navarrete, a spokeswoman for the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office, said the court order shows his civil rights have not been restored.
A felony conviction strips a person of their right to vote, serve as a juror and possess a firearm in Arizona. Once a person with only one felony pays their debt to society, their rights are automatically restored except for their gun rights, which requires applying for the restoration with the court. There’s no automatic restoration if the felony involved a weapon or certain crimes such as murder, kidnapping or sexual assault.
Someone like DeSanti, who has multiple felonies, must make separate applications with the court for each case and the court decides “each one separately,” according to the court’s 17-page application packet.
For anyone to hold public office, they must be a “qualified elector,” part of which is being “properly registered to vote,” according to the state Constitution and statute.
DeSanti is also facing a challenge to his signature count this year. The lawsuit filed on Monday alleges he is 102 signatures short of the minimum required to run for office in LD2, a politically competitive district covering the Cave Creek area.
Legislative District 2
The Arizona Mirror first reported about DeSanti’s failure to restore his rights in March 2024 before that year’s Republican primary. The article detailed how he had voted in numerous elections over the years and his short-lived attempts to run for Corporation Commission and Phoenix mayor in 2020 and 2021.
“I must have them restored, because I can vote and possess a firearm,” he told the Mirror at the time. “I’ve voted numerous times.”
It's a federal crime for someone to falsify or conceal facts when registering to vote, not to mention owning a firearm as a prohibited possessor. It's also a felony in Arizona to knowingly register to vote if you're ineligible, and a separate felony for actually voting if you know you’re ineligible.
Despite the previous coverage of his voting while ineligible, DeSanti has not been charged with any crimes related to illegal voting.
DeSanti's bid for the House in LD2 in 2022 ended when he lost a court challenge to his petition signatures. He withdrew his nomination in 2024 after LD2 Republican precinct committeeman Jeff Landay challenged him on his signature count and being ineligible to run because he never got his rights restored.
According to the lawsuit, attorney Brett Johnson had contacted him and urged him to withdraw to avoid the expense of court, and he pointed out how DeSanti acknowledged in his application to restore his rights that they had not been restored. DeSanti didn’t respond to his numerous emails, so Johnson said he was forced to file the suit by the filing deadline.
DeSanti posted a photo of the suit and raged on Twitter.
Around the time he quit his 2024 campaign, DeSanti began filing requests with the court to restore his rights in both cases, set aside his judgments, waive about $1,500 in probation fees he still owed and seal his criminal records.
The Maricopa County Attorney’s Office urged the court not to restore his rights, according to court documents.
DeSanti stressed in his various applications that he’s been law-abiding for years, completed his probation and that he wants to vote and run for public office. To waive his fees, he said, “I’m on a low income and can’t truly afford to pay any extra from my strict budget.”
He also applied to seal his criminal records, giving only one reason.
“I have entered the political arena in Arizona,” he wrote.
Each of those applications was denied.
DeSanti’s legal troubles began in 2005 when he pleaded guilty to a felony count of endangerment and misdemeanor DUI for which he got three years of probation. His 2010 conviction stems from a burglary in which he and a relative pried open the wrought iron bars of a fence and carried out two metal ramps from a commercial yard, according to court documents. He pleaded guilty to possessing burglary tools, which brought two years on probation.
DeSanti describes himself in his campaign literature and social media as a constitutional conservative and a MAGA candidate. He also imitates President Donald Trump’s penchant for namecalling and demonizing opponents. He refers to the Democratic National Committee as the Democrat National Communists, called Gov. Katie Hobbs a traitor, and referred to Californians as “commiefornia criminals.”
This animated video he posted to Facebook and on his campaign website claims “Democrats abducted your children and sold them to sex-trafficking pedophiles. They've also tried to kill them after the fourth trimester. Democrats have taught children to hate America, and even worse, to hate you, their parents.”
Click to watch at your own risk.
In 2020, he was interviewed as part of a series by USA Today about why voters are voting. He said his main issue was "gun control" — which he explained means less regulations and easier background checks for gun purchasers.
If he remains on the ballot, DeSanti will face Republican Rep. Justin Wilmeth and Danielle Skranak, who ironically founded a company that helps people restore their civil rights, in the July 21 GOP primary for the district’s two House seats.
We reported yesterday that five challenges to candidates’ signatures had been filed, but it turns out the Arizona Secretary of State’s Office was still updating its list throughout the day.
The office tells us that its webpage is now fully up-to-date, so let’s try this again.
This election season, a total of 24 challenges were filed, which is actually more than the 21 filed in 2024, and not quite as many as the 30 challenges filed in 2022.
However, one was already dismissed last week (Steve Slaton’s challenge of GOP Rep. Walt Blackman), two have been withdrawn, and three were consolidated into other challenges of the same candidates.
Effectively, that leaves 18 challenges that are ongoing and should be wrapped up in this week or next. We provided the details on a few yesterday, but here are some more:
Hugh Lytle, third-party candidate for governor, is facing two challenges. While one comes from a primary opponent in his own party (known as the Arizona Independent Party until a judge struck it down), he’s facing another from Democratic citizen Craig Beckman — who’s being represented by lawyer Bo Dul, a former chief legal advisor to Gov. Katie Hobbs. That lawsuit claims that none of Lytle’s signatures are valid because he used his Scottsdale business address on his nominating petitions (instead of a residential address).
Beckman and the same law team also challenged Green Party candidate Risa Lombardo, claiming that about half of the signatures she collected are invalid.
A challenge to Democratic candidate for Superintendent of Public Schools Dr. Michael Butts claims that at least 1,060 of the signatures he garnered are invalid, which would leave him 540 short of the required number.
Rosa Cantu — a Democrat running for House in Legislative District 24 — is facing an allegation that at least 469 of her signatures were forged and a total of 663 are invalid. If true, that would put her just below the 342 she needs (and potentially in legal trouble).
Former Democratic Rep. Eric Descheenie — a primary challenger to Jonathan Nez in Arizona’s 2nd Congressional District — has been challenged by Beverly Berg, who’s represented by notable Dem elections lawyer Roy Herrera. She claims 197 of Descheenie’s signatures are invalid; he’s only 137 signatures over the required minimum.
The fraudit never ended: Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen asked the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate Attorney General Kris Mayes — who also happens to be the person Petersen is trying to unseat in this year’s election. Petersen says Mayes and Secretary of State Adrian Fontes may have obstructed justice and tampered with witnesses when they told county recorders not to comply with grand jury subpoenas for private voter records. Mayes also asked Petersen whether he turned over private information when he released records from the Cyber Ninjas’ “fraudit” of the 2020 election to the U.S. Attorney’s Office last month. Yesterday, Fontes called Petersen’s referral to the U.S. Attorney’s Office “political theater” and Mayes said Petersen was “desperately seeking favor from a president who cannot accept that he lost his re-election in 2020 fair and square.”
Deafening silence: Arizona’s Democratic congressional delegation spoke out against President Donald Trump’s threat that “a whole civilization will die tonight,” but the state’s Republican delegation was noticeably quiet, the Republic’s Ronald J. Hansen and Laura Gersony report. For example, Democratic U.S. Sen. Ruben Gallego said Trump’s threat “spits on everything we stand for and is flat out illegal,” while Republican Rep. Andy Biggs posted about meeting with executives from Phoenix Children’s Hospital.
Men behaving badly: The chief investigator for Pinal County Attorney Brad Miller is in hot water after he body-slammed a Black teenager who ran a stop sign on his ebike, the Phoenix New Times’ Stephen Lemons reports. Richard “Hank” Mueller searched the 18-year-old and then slammed him on the ground, injuring his arms, legs and head. The teen spent the night in jail and then all charges were dropped.
Don’t get your hopes up: U.S. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said he’ll decide this month how much water the Bureau of Reclamation will release from reservoirs in the Upper Basin states, the Arizona Daily Star’s Tony Davis reports. But Burgum, speaking at an event in Tucson, warned that “nobody will be happy” with how the Colorado River’s water gets divvied up.
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He’s running: It’s starting to sound like Gallego might run for president in 2028 after all, Arizona Public Media’s Nick Rommel reports. Gallego told NBC News on Sunday he’d “have to look at” whether to run in the Democratic primary. He also talked up Democratic candidates who won in red states (like he did) and said they should consider running for president, especially if they won over Latino voters (like he did).
Calling all voters!
We recently told you that the Agenda team is moderating the Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission’s 2026 legislative debates.
But we need your help.
We wanna hear your questions for candidates. All you have to do is fill out this quick form — it only takes a second.
And if your question is good, we’ll ask it.
The questions that are most helpful (and likely to get asked) are ones that illuminate who the candidates are as a person. And how they think about, and would vote on, specific policies that matter to you.
And remember: These are questions for the primary election, so we’re especially hunting for questions that will draw out the differences between members of the same party.
What we don’t need are gotcha questions or personal attacks. Don’t bother flooding our form with that junk.
Thanks!
An off-duty sergeant at the Phoenix Police Department got all amped up to bait protesters into assaulting him during the national anti-ICE walkout in January.
It didn’t go the way he wanted it to.
Sgt. Dusten Mullen put on a mask, strapped a handgun to his hip and extra magazines to his other hip, and headed over to Hamilton High School in Chandler, Fox10’s Justin Lum reports.
Mullen was all set to “just let them all assault me” and “get all these kids in jail if they want to break the law.”
He taunted the high schoolers, saying they should “grow up and act like adults.”
But the worst assault he got was a teenage girl throwing a cup of water on him.
And now he’s under review by the police department’s Professional Standards Bureau.
As for the girl who threw water on him, Mullen tried to press charges, but the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office declined to prosecute her, saying there was “no reasonable likelihood of conviction.”