Arizona megathread

[Skill and Chance]

In the hindsight, I feel like I have been bit more harsher on Hobbs as a candidate..she probably isn't a great candidate but certainly not terrible. Her favourables look good in most of the Arizona polls I have seen so far. I just wish she would have accepted to debate.

At the end of day, Arizona is still like 3-5 points to right of the country and this was always going to be an extremely tight race. Kelly's lead in the polls is probably more due to him being incumbent and Masters lacking money and being a poor candidate.

Agreeing to debate someone who appears on TV for a living is very risky when you don't also have that background.

[Skill and Chance]

Why is Lake holding up so much better than Mastriano?

[Skill and Chance]

So many of the props just seem like the GOP chewing away at voting rights.  Given how big citizen referenda are here, I hope people can see through them.  It would be funny ('cause it's sad) if 132 (which will require 60% approval for future initiatives) passes with less than 60% of the vote.  I think the same thing happened in Florida when they passed their 60% law.

Since I always vote by mail, 309 doesn't seem like that big of a deal, but requiring photo ID for in-person voting will likely make E-day voting even more of a mess.

I honestly have to confess I'm undecided on 308 though.

All of that said, I'm shocked how little airtime any of these have gotten.  Some of the props in the past (marijuana, marriage, etc) absolutely sucked the air out of the room as I remember.

Prop 309 affects VBM! It will make us write our DL or SS # on our ballot sleeves, which will only add processing time to counting mail ballots. It’s very convenient that the same people who say counting takes too long are adding hurdles that will elongate the process. Easy no from me.

I think all the initiative-related ones pass unfortunately, and so does 309. The one bright spot will be dark money passing. Who knows about the property tax or Lt Gov, but I’m voting no for both.

308 seems like a no brainer yes to me. Keep students in state, get them reinvesting in AZ.

310 is the difficult one, the only one I’m undecided about. Why am I paying a sales tax to fund rural fire districts?? At the same time, we live in a failed state when we can’t operate basic public safety and emergency services. That one probably fails anyway, since no one wants a new tax in this environment.

You think the 60% threshold for taxes will pass in AZ?  A similar 60% threshold initiative got absolutely destroyed in SD this spring, and that was with the primary electorate.

[Skill and Chance]

For the good of democracy, Cochise county should certify. But for the good of the nation, they should not.

No no no no no!!!! Would you like it if an R-controlled county that happened to vote D, refused to certify? No? I thought not.

This would set a precedent tor governments to do what Trump wanted the R legislatures of Georgia and Arizona to do in 2020! It’s putting your political preferences above the rule of law. Anyone who believes in the rule cannot with integrity want this county to not certify. To want it to happen for political benefit makes you no better than a Trumpist in this regard.

This.

Some court will compel them to certify, right?

[Skill and Chance]

Hobbs won three of the Phoenix suburb seats by pretty big margins, and flipped SD-2 from Trump's 2020 win there.   She won 17 of 30 seats overall (winning SD-17 with a  few hundred votes).  I'd think the Republicans are pretty much guaranteed to lose the legislature the next time there's a good national environment for Democrats (which 2022 actually wasn't when looking at Dem turnout).

Arizona Senators and House reps both serve two year terms with 8 year term limits, so incumbency won't save Republicans forever either.

https://twitter.com/Jamal___James/status/1600003237842538496

It's one of the less consequential legislatures anyway, between the redistricting commission, voter initiatives, and the supermajority requirement for anything that raises taxes.