Vernon Parker/submitted photo

Paradise Valley Mayor Vernon Parker has been talking for weeks about possibly entering next year’s race for Arizona governor as a Republican. He took a step closer today toward a possible challenge to Gov. Jan Brewer by creating an exploratory committee. This comes a day ahead of a public rally at InterContinental Montelucia Resort and Spa that Parker’s PR expert has been promoting as a “major announcement.” The setting and tone of Parker’s speech is likely to make him look exactly like a candidate running for statewide office, although he might not actually declare just yet to avoid any questions about triggering Arizona’s “resign to run” law. Parker certainly has created a lot of buzz among Republicans that, as a candidate of color, he could match enthusiasm for Barack Obama among independents and moderate voters of both major parties. Parker also could be viewed as an outsider to the state Capitol who would bring some fresh ideas to tackling the state budget mess. I expect Parker to oppose Brewer’s proposed sales tax election, so it will be interesting to see how he would pursue shrinking state government by $3 billion to $4 billion to match current tax revenues.

A huge plus for Parker is he already has picked up the support of Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arapio, although Arpaio supplied the oddest sounding endorsement today in a news release from Parker’s camp:

” ‘Mayor Parker is a stand-up guy with an unbelievable personal story. His candidacy would be very good for our Party and potentially our state,’ said Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, qualifying that he has still not closed the door completely on running for governor himself and is not yet endorsing any candidate for governor if he does not run.”

Posted in: Arizona government • Election issues • Governor • Jan Brewer • Vernon Parker |

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.