Arizona: Open primary group facing GOP challenge on financial disclosure | Arizona Daily Sun

A group working to change election laws and tighten up rules on “dark money” is facing a complaint that it is illegally hiding the source of its own cash. Tim LaSota, attorney for the Arizona Republican Party, said that former gubernatorial hopeful Paul Johnson is taking donations and spending money to craft an initiative for the 2016 ballot. LaSota said that means he needs to comply with campaign finance laws. But Johnson, who previously was the mayor of Phoenix, said he is doing nothing illegal. He said the requirement to report is triggered by actually coming up with specific language to put on the ballot, something that has not yet occurred. Only then, Johnson said, need he disclose who is financing the effort.

Arizona: Redistricting to get Supreme Court hearing | Arizona Daily Star

The nation’s high court will hear arguments in less than two months on the legality of the state’s 30 legislative districts, setting the stage for a ruling that could realign political lines for the 2016 election. Attorney Mark Hearne, representing Republicans challenging the current districts, said Monday the Dec. 8 hearing could portend a quick ruling by the Supreme Court. And he said if the justices side with him — and against the Independent Redistricting Commission — there is probably no excuse to keep the current lines in place for the next election. Mary O’Grady, who represents the commission, said she’s not sure the case can move that quickly. But if the case goes against the commission, it could send shock waves through the system, whether next year or in 2018.

Arizona: Former legislator proposes redistricting reform | Arizona Republic

A former Republican legislator has come up with a genius idea for how to fix what ails the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission. OK, so maybe it’s not a genius idea, exactly, but it’s a pretty good one, given that the current system is a slap in the face to the largest segment of Arizona voters. First reason it seems like a good idea: The Republican Party, which controls most everything in this state, won’t like it. Second reason it seems like a good idea: Neither will the Democratic Party, which managed to outmaneuver Republicans when it came to redrawing congressional and legislative maps for this decade. Third reason: It gives a fair shake to independent voters.

Arizona: Utility regulators seek legal advice on dark money | The Arizona Republic

Utility regulators at the Arizona Corporation Commission asked Tuesday for a legal opinion from their staff about dark-money political contributions that utilities could be making toward the campaigns of candidates who, if elected, will set their rates. Susan Bitter Smith and Bob Burns are trying to encourage utilities and other entities such as rooftop-solar groups from funding independent political groups that advertise for and against candidates for the commission. But they said they need more information on whether they can force utilities to disclose such spending

Arizona: Reagan joins in effort to void redistricting plan | Arizona Daily Sun

Secretary of State Michele Reagan has joined with Republican interests in asking the U.S. Supreme Court to void the state’s current legislative redistricting plan. In new filings with the high court, attorneys for Reagan point out the population differences among the 30 legislative districts created in 2011 by the Independent Redistricting Commission. They said this, by itself, raises constitutional questions because it effectively gives voters in some districts more power than others. But what’s particularly problematic, they said, is that the disparity was done deliberately to achieve a result of improving the chances of Democrats getting elected to the Legislature. “It suggests, if not proves, a built-in bias in the IRC’s redistricting process,” her attorneys wrote.

Arizona: Secretary of state wants redistricting plan voided | Arizona Daily Star

Secretary of State Michele Reagan has joined with Republican interests in asking the U.S. Supreme Court to void the state’s legislative redistricting plan. In new filings with the high court, attorneys for Reagan point out the population differences among the 30 legislative districts created in 2011 by the Independent Redistricting Commission. They said this raises constitutional questions because it effectively gives voters in some districts more power than others. But what’s particularly problematic, they said, is that the disparity was done deliberately to achieve a result of improving the chances of Democrats getting elected to the Legislature. “It suggests, if not proves, a built-in bias in the IRC’s redistricting process,” her attorneys wrote.

Arizona: Secretary of State to elections panel: ‘Tread lightly’ on dark money rules | Arizona Republic

The turf war between the Arizona Secretary of State and the Clean Elections Commission is continuing, but on a slower timetable and with softer, yet stern, rhetoric. On Thursday, Secretary of State Michele Reagan told the five commissioners to “tread lightly” as they consider a rule that could force disclosure of so-called “dark-money” contributors. “I believe you have noble intentions,” Reagan said. “You want to be able to rein in groups if they corrupt our election system.” But, she continued, the way the commission is trying to do that would set a precedent that she called “extremely troubling.”

Arizona: 9th Circuit Endorses Arizona Ballot Form | Courthouse News Service

Arizona may continue to use a ballot registration form that lists only the two largest political parties in the state, the Ninth Circuit ruled Friday. The Arizona Libertarian and Green parties, and three of their members, sued then-Secretary of State Ken Bennett in 2011 after the state legislature decided that only the two largest political parties would be listed by name on voter registration forms. The plaintiffs in the lawsuit filed in Tucson Federal Court claimed the statute discriminated against Green and Libertarian voters, who now had to write out their party affiliation in a small box, forcing them to “abbreviate, and run the risk that their abbreviation is illegible or misread.”

Arizona: Court rules some double voting not illegal | Arizona Daily Sun

It turns out that the old quip about voting early and often is not illegal in Arizona. In a unanimous ruling Tuesday, the state Court of Appeals threw out the conviction of a Bullhead City woman who prosecutors said voted in both Colorado and Arizona. The judges said the way the Arizona law is worded, people who are qualified to vote here can also cast ballots in other states — assuming the other states don’t have a problem with it. In fact, appellate Judge Kenton Jones said the only way to break the Arizona law with multi-state voting is when a presidential candidate is on the ballot. Carol Hannah was indicted in 2013 after prosecutors said she cast an early ballot in the 2010 election in Adams County, Colo. and then went to the polls that November in Bullhead City. She was convicted of illegal voting, a felony, and placed on probation for three years.

Arizona: Tucson election with no races to cost $540,000 | Arizona Daily Star

It’s already clear who will win in the city’s Primary Election next month. Every candidate is unopposed. But the election must go on — and it will cost taxpayers about $540,000. In the Aug. 25 election, members of each political party, and independent voters who opted to choose a party ballot, will select candidates for mayor and City Council member in Wards 1, 2 and 4. The winners advance to the Nov. 3 General Election.

Arizona: Legal battle looms over proposed dark-money rules | The Arizona Republic

The Arizona Secretary of State’s Office all but declared war Thursday on a state agency that is attempting to shine a light on “dark money” contributions. And it’s willing to sue the Citizens Clean Elections Commission to stop the effort. Unless the agency backs down on a proposed rule that would require some campaign committees to reveal their donors, a lawsuit is “inevitable,” state Elections Director Eric Spencer told the five commissioners. Spencer argued that the commission doesn’t have the authority to regulate independent-expenditure committees, which have proliferated since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2010 ruling in the Citizens United case.

Arizona: Secretary of State dumps election vendor after repeated slowness | Arizona Republic

The secretary of state has dumped the vendor responsible for publishing Arizona’s election results online after persistent problems on Election Day in 2012 and 2014. The state’s election website was slow, difficult to load and produced error messages during the 2012 primary and general elections. In 2014, former Secretary of State Ken Bennett and the election vendor SOE Software promised improvements, but the problems persisted with outages and errors that frustrated voters and candidates. Matt Roberts, spokesman for the secretary of state, said the contract was not renewed in March, because of SOE Software’s poor election-night performances, “communication issues,” and the system’s limited customization features.

Arizona: Supreme Court to Re-examine Arizona Panel That Draws Voting Maps | Wall Street Journal

The Supreme Court said Tuesday it would take another look at an independent panel that draws Arizona’s electoral maps, a day after the court ruled states can use such commissions for redistricting. The high court’s Monday decision, which came on a 5-4 vote, focused on allowing states to use commissions to draw district boundaries for federal elections. The new case examines whether Arizona’s panel violated the law in how it set boundaries for state races beginning in 2012. A group of state voters brought the challenge, arguing the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission created districts with varying numbers of voters that diluted the power of Republican districts in favor of Democrats.

Arizona: Supreme Court agrees to hear new challenge to redistricting commission | Arizona PBS

Just one day after it said the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission was legal, the Supreme Court on Tuesday said it will hear a challenge to the commission’s Statehouse district plans. The court agreed to hear a case brought by more than a dozen Arizona voters who accused the commission in 2012 of improperly drawing legislative district boundaries to favor Democrats. Specifically, the suit claims the commission “underpopulated” liberal-leaning districts while packing voters into GOP-leaning districts. That diluted votes in the “overpopulated” Republican districts, violating the one-person, one-vote rule, the lawsuit said. A lower court disagreed, but the Supreme Court said Tuesday it will review that decision after it reconvenes this fall.

Arizona: Republicans Planning Redistricting Push After SCOTUS Decision | Morning Consult

The U.S. Supreme Court is nearing a decision over the constitutionality of independent commissions created to draw district lines, but lawmakers in Arizona aren’t waiting for the outcome to start radically redrawing the state’s political boundaries — for their own gain. House and Senate leaders have already begun discussing how and where to redraw lines, and they are likely to come to some sort of agreement over the summer, sources close to Republican leaders in both chambers said. Once an agreement is close, Gov. Doug Ducey (R) would call a special legislative session to dispense with the new maps.

Arizona: Redistricting plan begins ahead of court decision | Arizona Republic

The meter’s running … Work has already begun on drawing new congressional maps at the Legislature, even as the political world awaits a ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court on whether that would even be needed. The House and Senate leaders inked a $65,000 contract with National Demographics Corp. in late May. The Glendale, Calif.-based firm is no stranger to Arizona: It did the redistricting duties for the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission in 2001. Back then, the Legislature had no quarrel with the IRC, unlike this decade, when it took the commission to court, challenging its authority to draw congressional boundaries.

Arizona: Legislature, Congress at odds on redistricting | Arizona Republic

Members of Congress are squaring off with the Arizona Legislature, seeking to stop it from shaking up Arizona’s political map — and possibly others across the country — before the 2016 elections. An upcoming U.S. Supreme Court decision could strip the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission of the authority to draw congressional districts and give that power to the Republican-led Legislature. If the court rules in favor of the Arizona Legislature, lawmakers might redraw the map at breakneck speed in the fall ahead of next year’s elections. They would likely add a Republican tilt to swing districts, hurting the re-election prospects of U.S. Reps. Ann Kirkpatrick and Kyrsten Sinema, both Democrats. But the impact could be the opposite in other states, like California, where independent redistricting commissions could be challenged as well.

Arizona: Yavapai County Supervisors weigh how to pay for vital election equipment | The Prescott Daily Courier

Yavapai County Supervisors working through dozens of decisions with the new fiscal year budget have a critical decision hanging over the Elections Department’s inserter, which prepares ballots for mailing. A decision must be made before the Prescott Election this year, and they have delayed the decision for another day. The Microsoft XP software that drives the equipment becomes obsolete Oct. 1, with about a $1 million replacement cost looming. At the same time, the supervisors are looking to cut some of each of various departments’ budget requests to adopt a balanced budget for 2015-16 beginning July 1. County Recorder Leslie Hoffman, who administers Voter Registration and Early Voting, says her department has been anticipating the change for as long as three years and pricing out the options.

Arizona: Cochise County plans overhaul for elections system | The Sierra Vista Herald

Recounts, inefficient or outdated voting equipment, and efforts to keep up with the changing times have put Cochise County in the market for all-new electoral infrastructure. Staff from the county’s procurement, geographic information system, elections and special districts, and the county attorney’s office, met with the board of supervisors at a work session on Tuesday. … Elections staff saw a demonstration of Yavapai County’s Unisyn Voting Systems Inc. equipment, an ES&S demo in Graham County, and demonstrations of Pinal County’s central count approach. Unisyn also provided a local demo, as did ES&S. In February, the Arizona Secretary of State conducted a joint training session for county elections and recorder’s office staff.

Arizona: Federal court upholds election law | Arizona Daily Star

A federal appeals court on Friday upheld a 2011 Arizona law designed by Republicans to slow the tide of people not registering with their party. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals acknowledged that the statute says voter registration forms can specifically list the names of only the two parties with the highest number of members, and list them in the order of most adherents. That means the Republicans and Democrats. And anyone who wants to register as a Libertarian or otherwise has to fill in that party’s name on a line that’s less than an inch long. But Judge Wallace Tashima, writing for the three-judge panel, said that differentiation was not enough of a burden on minor parties — or those who want to sign up for them — to make it illegal.

Arizona: Races stuck in idle over redistricting case | Politico

Many of the most vulnerable House incumbents have already attracted challengers for 2016 — but not in Arizona, where races are largely on hold thanks to a Supreme Court case that’s threatening to erase the state’s congressional map. The case, which pits Arizona’s Republican-dominated Legislature against its Independent Redistricting Commission, could invalidate maps that were drawn by the commission in 2011 and that give the Legislature power to reshape the state’s congressional districts ahead of the 2016 election. Republicans in the Arizona Legislature would be able to draw more GOP voters into the state’s three most competitive districts, potentially undercutting Democratic Reps. Ann Kirkpatrick and Kyrsten Sinema and aiding newly elected GOP Rep. Martha McSally.

Arizona: Independents still get GOP primary vote | Arizona Daily Sun

Arizona’s nearly 1.2 million political independents will be able to continue to influence who Republicans nominate for office, at least for the foreseeable future. The executive committee of the Arizona Republican Party on Saturday rejected a proposal to try to close future primaries and limit participation to the 1.1 million who are officially members of the Grand Old Party. Party spokesman Tim Sifert said committee members concluded it made no sense to try to challenge a 1998 voter-approved measure which paved the way for independents to vote. That vote came despite a recommendation from state precinct committeemen to shut out the independents. But Sifert said such a legal move might cost $75,000. And he said only the executive committee can spend party money.

Arizona: Election laws to favor major parties | Arizona Daily Sun

Elections are about to get easier for major party candidates — especially those who have access to big-dollar donors. And voters who want to craft their own laws will find new hurdles, as Gov. Doug Ducey on Monday signed three measures approved by the Republican-controlled Legislature, including:
– Sharply boosting the number of signatures minor-party candidates would need to qualify for the ballot;
– Allowing candidates to accept up to $5,000 from any one source, a 25 percent increase since the last election;
– Requiring judges to throw out citizen-sponsored initiative, referendum and recall petitions if there are technical flaws in the paperwork.
It is the measure on petition signatures, though, that could have the biggest impact.

Arizona: Court cuts political map-drawers some slack | The Arizona Republic

The big U.S. Supreme Court decision affecting redistricting in Arizona, regarding whether drawing the lines for congressional districts has to be returned to the state Legislature from the independent redistricting commission, is still to come. But a decision handed down a couple of weeks ago (Alabama Legislative Black Caucus v. Alabama) changed the game regardless of who next draws the lines.

Arizona: Thousands of Arizona Voting Ballots Going Uncounted Every Election, Report Says | Phoenix New Times

Thousands upon thousands of votes aren’t counted every election year in Arizona, according to a new report. The Arizona Advocacy Network, which is run by a onetime Democratic politician, released a report detailing how Arizona’s election laws affect voter turnout, and it doesn’t look good — through public records and voter data, the organization found that more than 100,000 votes haven’t been counted over the last 10 years. “When it comes to disenfranchising eligible voters, Arizona is, unfortunately, a national leader,” the report states. “These discarded votes were not the result of fraud, which is so extremely rare it borders on nonexistent. These were eligible voters – sometimes confused, sometimes misinformed or merely forgetful, sometimes willfully targeted because they share a common last name.” For example, there were more than 121,000 provisional ballots rejected from 2006 to 2014.

Arizona: Republican lawmakers advance election bills | Associated Press

Arizona Republican legislators advanced several bills Monday that would restore key provisions of a sweeping election law that was repealed last year, saying they want to root out fraud and clarify existing state regulations. The proposals aim to allow donors to contribute more money to candidates, make it easier for judges to throw out signatures for technical errors on ballot measures and expand campaign signature requirements. Critics, including Democratic legislative leaders, say the efforts aim to make voting more difficult.

Arizona: House panel OKs bill making early ballot collection illegal | Associated Press

A bill that will make it all but impossible for voter-outreach groups to boost turnout by collecting early ballots from voters was advanced by an Arizona House panel dominated by Republicans on Wednesday. The proposal makes it a felony for anyone but a family member, caregiver or candidate to collect more than two early ballots from voters during a two-year election cycle. Republican Secretary of State Michele Reagan is backing the last-minute amendment to Senate Bill 1339. The proposal failed in the House elections committee last week, but it was revived and added to an unrelated bill. The appropriations committee approved the amended bill on a 9-5 party-line vote.

Arizona: Senate gives initial approval to elections bill | Associated Press

The Senate gave initial approval to a bill on Tuesday that increases the number of signatures third-party candidates need to run for office. The proposal by J.D. Mesnard, R-Chandler, is one in a series of piecemeal legislation similar to a sweeping Arizona election law that the Legislature abandoned last year after opponents took steps to repeal it. House Bill 2608 allows candidates to gather signatures from their own party, independents and parties not represented on a ballot. It also expands the signature requirements to include a minimum number of these so-called “qualified voters.”

Arizona: Ban on Ballot Collection Voted Down by Arizona Lawmakers | Phoenix New Times

Arizona lawmakers yesterday rejected another attempt to ban the practice of people collecting others’ election ballots to turn in. Such a practice was utilized by the group Citizens for a Better Arizona during the successful 2012 recall of then-Senate President Russell Pearce. CBA workers collected early-voting ballots from voters who agreed to have their completed ballot hand-delivered to elections officials to make sure it was counted. A ban on such a practice was included in 2013’s House Bill 2305, a Republican-backed package of changes to election law. Seeing that Democrats, third-party supporters, and other non-Republicans had enough support to put the issue on the ballot for voters to decide, the Republican-led Legislature repealed the whole law last year, but Democrats have kept their eye out for any attempts to pass parts of this bill again.

Arizona: Proposal would make it illegal to collect early ballots | Associated Press

An effort to revive a major piece of a repealed 2013 election law by making it a felony for anyone but a family member or candidate to collect early ballots from voters failed in a House committee Thursday. The proposal was tacked on to a bill during a special meeting of the House elections committee, but it went down on a 3-3 vote. Rep. Heather Carter, R-Cave Creek, joined two Democrats in opposition. The so-called ‘strike-everything” amendment backed by Secretary of State Michele Reagan revived a part of a major election overhaul that angered Democrats, some conservative Republicans and third-party candidates. After a successful signature-gathering effort to block the 2013 law, pending a statewide election, the Legislature repealed House Bill 2305.