Primary pop quiz
Top score wins a hat ... We're the Best (TM) ... And it really is a smoking deal.
For the last month, we’ve been sending you little cheat sheets to the legislative primaries that matter.
Today, we want to see if you’ve been paying attention.
So we’re launching our inaugural “Primary Prepping Pop Quiz” to test how well you know your future lawmakers.
Match the “fun fact” to the correct candidate to win this fine Arizona Agenda hat.1 The runner-up2 gets one of these lovely Agenda pins.
So sharpen your pencils and put away your notes, because the pop quiz starts now.
The tiebreaker question is: How many candidates qualified for the primary election ballot for the Legislature, statewide? (There are 90 slots, so your answer should be higher than 90. Also, we’re not using “Price is Right” rules, so going over is OK.)
Leave a comment to answer it.
Before we let you go, we have to brag about winning Phoenix Magazine’s “Best of the Valley” yet again this year.
The local culture magazine declared that the Agenda “has its finger on the pulse of the political process here in Arizona” and named us overall Best “Podcast/Blog/Substack” (in a tie with the Finding Arizona Podcast).
And we obviously took home the more niche title of “Best Political Newsletter.”
Phoenix Magazine has been hip to the Agenda for a while — they called us the Valley’s “Best Substack” last year. And the Phoenix New Times was the first to bestow the “Best Political Newsletter” title on us back in 2022, shortly after we launched.
Here’s what Phoenix Magazine said this year:
A huge thanks to Phoenix Magazine! Go check out their full Best of the Valley list for everything from the best urban farm to the best women's restroom mirror.
Finally, we wanna take a minute to talk about that write-up.
The Yellow Sheet Report, for the uninitiated, is a paywalled, $3,600-per-year tip sheet covering the state Capitol for insiders and lobbyists.
The Agenda costs $120 annually3 and most of what we publish is free to everyone, whether they pay for the Agenda or not.
The Agenda is not designed to be a competitor to the Yellow Sheet.
But it says a lot about the value we provide to our readers that we’re constantly compared to a newsletter that costs $3,600.
And the Agenda only works because of the support we receive from regular people, not political special interests.
Our tagline is “an insider politics newsletter for political outsiders.”
We know the Capitol crowd reads us religiously. But our “avatar” reader is not a lobbyist or lawmaker — they’re a public school teacher who wants a better understanding of local politics and government.
Our standard paid subscriber gets referred by a friend, reads for free for a few months and finds it so valuable that they voluntarily cough up $120 of their hard-earned dollars to reward and support us.
That is our business model.
It’s not the most lucrative model we could have come up with. But it consistently produces the “best” newsletter in Arizona.
So please, if you’re a free reader who has ever considered upgrading your subscription, think of the value you’re getting from the Agenda.
And know that it’s up to you to keep it alive and thriving.4
And if you’re a politician, lobbyist or insider who reads the Agenda as religiously as you used to read the Yellow Sheet, consider putting more of your resources into a local publication that’s invested in local journalism.
You can do that by becoming a founding member for $500 per year or buying a discounted group subscription to the Agenda for your whole office.
As always, thank you for your support!
We won’t send this actual hat that Scooby is wearing. You’ll get a fresh one, we swear.
Or runners-up, in the case of a tie.
That’s 3% of the Yellow Sheet’s price.
And also, July is one of our worst months, so it’s a good time to click the button.
190, Bob!
285? I have to think that between both parties there should be something like 2-3 senate candidates per district, and 3-4 house candidates per district.