The Daily Agenda: It's prediction time (for you)
The Daily Agenda: It's prediction time (for you)
One more day until the primaries are over ... We can't handle another pen-based conspiracy theory ... And we wish our stickers were this cool.
Tomorrow is the final day of voting in the primary election, and we want to give you one last chance to prove how politically savvy you are.
Predict who will win Arizona’s hot primary races, and the reader with the most correct answers will score a free lunch with us, the editors of this newsletter, at the Valley restaurant of your choice. Taco Bell? Durant’s? Whatever!
Will Karrin Taylor Robson, with the backing of Gov. Doug Ducey and former VP Mike Pence, pull off an upset in the gubernatorial primary? Will Marco Lopez surge from behind on the Dem side? Is Tom Horne gonna make a comeback as superintendent of public instruction? Which of the six Republicans running for attorney general will get to lead their party into November?
Will Donald Trump’s slate sweep the legislative primaries and make the Arizona Legislature even more MAGA? Will moderate Democrats surge in legislative primaries, or is it a progressive year for the party?
We don’t know! You tell us! (Just click this link to fill out and submit the survey.)
As a reminder, independent voters can vote in the primary. But they don’t automatically get a ballot in the mail unless they ask.
So for all you Maricopa County independents who didn’t get a ballot, come on down to the voting center at the Phoenix Art Museum where Hank will be working the polls (or any other voting location) to cast a ballot in person. And you partisans who are still holding onto your ballot: Remember to drop it off! (Preferably today. Dropping off ballots on Election Day slows down the count and means we all have to wait longer to get final election results.)
Sinema, once again: Democratic U.S. Sens. Joe Manchin and Chuck Schumer struck a deal on a massive climate and tax package, and U.S. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema again will prove critical to the plan’s ability to survive. With all eyes on her, Sinema hasn’t said whether she’d support the deal, which Manchin and Schumer negotiated without her. “Sinema has given no assurances to colleagues that she’ll vote along party lines” on the bill, Axios reports.
Inundated, verb, meaning to overwhelm: Shot: Redistricting commissioner David Mehl saying he was “inundated” by people asking for changes to legislative maps as part of his reasoning for changing maps to remove two GOP incumbents from Dem-heavy districts. Chaser: “There are no records of any communications to or from the two commissioners regarding those changes on the two days changes were made,” Axios’ Jeremy Duda reports.
What would we do without golf?: Golf courses in Arizona are often using more water than they’re allotted by the state, resulting in some slaps on the wrist, if anything, the Republic’s Balint Fabok reports. The water usage comes as our state’s water supply is in peril, as you know from the many times we’ve mentioned that in the newsletter. If you want to learn all the Colorado River water jargon, check out this glossary from Circle of Blue.
Despicable: A man in Massachusetts was arrested and charged for making a bomb threat to Secretary of State Katie Hobbs’ office last year, though he mistakenly referred to her office as the attorney general, Capitol Media Services’ Howie Fischer reports. His internet searches showed keywords related to killing an election official and the Boston Marathon bombing.
You people and your pens: Use the Pentel pen if you’re voting in person tomorrow. The ink dries quickly and doesn’t affect votes on the other side because the ballot is offset. This isn’t hard. We can’t handle #PentelGate. In a somewhat related note, from our neighbors in Nevada, one county there decided to hand-count its ballots instead of using tabulation machines, resulting in the election administrator quitting her job.
New wall incoming: Biden is going to build! that! wall! Or at least fill in some gaps in the wall near the Morelos Dam near Yuma, which the Biden administration says will help ensure migrants don’t drown while trying to cross in that area, the Associated Press’ Anita Snow reports.
Mayor vs. mayor: To manage incoming migrants bused to the nation’s capital from Arizona and Texas, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser wants help from the National Guard, the Washington Post reports. Local aid groups are helping the new arrivals, now numbering several thousand. (In Arizona, the Arizona National Guard has been deployed to the U.S.-Mexico border for a while.) Meanwhile, on Fox News, Yuma Mayor Douglas Nicholls essentially welcomed Bowser to his world, saying “imagine what it's doing to a community of 100,000 people along the border when there are thousands and thousands a day.”
Drink up: A state audit (the reputable kind) found that the Arizona Department of Liquor Licenses and Control needed to follow conflict-of-interest rules and better monitor public money, KJZZ’s Matthew Casey reports.
Emails are public records: The antisemitic/Christian nationalist CEO of far-right social platform Gab endorsed a slate of Republicans in Arizona primaries, two of whom welcomed his support — secretary of state candidate Mark Finchem and Arizona Senate candidate Wendy Rogers, the Arizona Mirror’s Jim Small reports. Speaking of Finchem, the Phoenix New Times’ Elias Weiss dives into the lawmaker’s inbox to show how he became obsessed with election denialism, spurred by an unsubstantiated emailer who claimed fraud in Pima County then deactivated his email address.
“Mark really bought into the idea that something had gone wrong with the election and was in a mindset to believe what anyone said, including a no-name person using a made-up email,” Finchem’s former consultant, Chris Baker, told New Times.
No dogs allowed: A patient at the Arizona State Hospital who uses a service dog has sued the hospital after getting denied repeatedly when requesting his dog accompany him at the hospital, KJZZ’s Amy Silverman reports. Because the dog isn’t with him, he hasn’t been able to attend group therapy, part of his treatment. And in an especially sad turn, the dog died in July, while the case is ongoing.
Kari Lake roundup: In the Washington Post, Yvonne Wingett Sanchez details how election denialism and altering how Arizonans vote play a key role in GOP gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake’s run for office and potential governorship. Separately, Lake wants the AG’s office to investigate Karrin Taylor Robson’s trip on a state-owned plane with Gov. Doug Ducey after a campaign event. To nerd out a bit on Lake’s social media prowess compared to other guv candidates, check out this dispatch from fellow Substack newsletter, FWIW.
Who’s got the money in Arizona’s legislative races?: Wendy Rogers, mostly. The Republic’s Ray Stern rounds out the legislative fundraising numbers ahead of the primary, noting that former lawmaker and audit liaison Ken Bennett is getting trounced in his bid to return to the Capitol, longtime lawmaker John Kavanagh is struggling to keep up against a MAGA newcomer and Rusty Bowers has the edge both in his campaign coffers and in outside spending.
Money ain’t the only thing that matters: Facing Trump-endorsed former lawmaker David Farnsworth in the primary, Bowers is “bracing himself for a loss even as he tries to make the case to voters that he’s done the right thing,” Wingett Sanchez writes in the Washington Post.
Speaking of money, we got a few questions over the weekend that asked, incredulously, who was paying us to write this newsletter. Well, it’s a conspiracy of about 1,200 paying subscribers who all pitch in a small amount annually! Ideally, you’re one of them. If not, click below to subscribe.
Dueling election measures: There’s already a lawsuit over whether you’ll be able to vote on a measure that expands voting access. The Arizona Free Enterprise Club claims the measure does not have enough valid signatures to make the ballot, Capitol Media Services’ Howie Fischer reports.
It’s actually 2022: Vox interviews Republic reporters Mary Jo Pitzl and Stacey Barchenger who run down the various ways the 2020 election never ended, in case you needed reminding.
Always check the metadata: Pitzl looks at the metadata of Democratic secretary of state candidate Reginald Bolding’s firewall agreement that governs how the dark money group he runs must operate to prevent any coordination, finding that the document says it was created about a year ago, but the underlying data show it was created in June.
New top cop: Phoenix named an interim police chief, Michael Sullivan of the Baltimore Police Department, to serve in the role after Jeri Williams retires. Meanwhile, two police commanders are now being investigated by the department because ABC15 reporter Dave Biscobing aired some secret recordings that cast doubt on Williams’ knowledge of the gang charges.
A bad cop: As publicity hound and Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb is teaming up with a host of other election deniers at True The Vote (the group behind the “2,000 Mules” mockumentary), voters should be concerned, the Daily Star’s Tim Steller writes.
“A politician like Lamb, ignorant of election procedures but armed with cocksure certainty that his side has been wronged, could insert his uniformed officers on the side of people claiming election irregularities. Or he could allow posse volunteers or militia groups to take actions themselves,” Steller writes.
Fake news alert: Rachel went on CNN’s “Reliable Sources” to talk about candidates campaigning against the media, declaring Lake’s penchant for making reporters characters in her campaign “bizarre” and saying reporters don’t need access to politicians to do good journalism.
The most important thing to know about Legislative District 26 is it’s where Hank lives. It spans west Phoenix from about 19th Avenue to 51st Avenue, from Van Buren Street in the south to Peoria Avenue in the north. It’s heavily Democratic, and its total population is about 60% Latino, 20% white and 10% Black.
Secondly, it’s a Democratic stronghold where four Democrats are vying for two House seats in the primary.
Rep. Christian Solorio Acuña, who was appointed to the House last year, serves on the Alhambra Elementary School District Governing Board and works in the affordable housing sector. He’ll face attorney Gil Hacohen, who was born in Israel and is focusing his campaign on the district’s homelessness problem and affordable housing; Flavio Bravo, who worked for U.S. Rep. Raúl Grijalva in D.C. and has the backing of progressive organizations like Planned Parenthood and the Sierra Club; and Cesar Aguilar, who worked as a field director for the state Democratic Party, served on the Balsz School District Governing Board and serves as executive director of the Arizona Students’ Association.
Republican Frank Roberts is also trying to qualify for the November ballot in the LD26 House race via a write-in campaign.
Meanwhile, Democratic Party Chair and state Sen. Raquel Terán is running unopposed for the Senate. She was appointed from the House last year to replace Tony Navarrete following his arrest for molesting a child1. Teran faces no Republican opposition in November.
Hudson Rowan, age 14, perfectly captured the “chaotic vibe” of voting in 2022 with the “I voted” sticker he drew for a contest in Ulster County, New York.
As NPR reports, Rowan describes the drawing as having “crazy bulging eyes, mangled looking hair ... (and) some crazy, like, spider robot legs shooting outta the sides.” He says the picture represents more than just voting, but “all that is going on in the world right now.”
Ashley Dittus, the commissioner of the Ulster County Board of Elections, told NPR that most of the submissions included red, white and blue; or maybe images of mountains to represent their county in the Catskills. In other words, they were boring. Rowan’s art stood out.
"It hits a nerve,” Dittus told NPR. “It makes people on both sides of the aisle feel like, yep, this is what voting is like … This is what participating in our democracy looks like in 2022.”
CORRECTION: A previous version of this piece incorrectly stated Teran replaced Meza in the Senate. She replaced Navarrete. Meza still serves in the House, though he’s running for justice of the peace this year. Additionally, Aguilar no longer serves on the Balsz school board.
I wonder if Hobb's lack of posting on social media has anything to do with staff turnover