Archive for the 'Election issues' Category
October 5th, 2009, 5:06 pm by Le Templar
 Jason Rose (right) is the public relations specialist/political strategist who is in charge of attracting public attention to the likely campaign for governor of Paradise Valley Mayor Vernon Parker (left). Now that Republican Vernon Parker is in the race for governor (almost), we in the media received today the first of what could be daily missives from his press agent, Scottsdale political provocateur Jason Rose. Typically, a candidate or business hires Rose’s PR firm to make a big public splash and then to keep the spotlight burning, as Rose and Co. specialize in attention-grabbing headlines and other tactics almost guaranteed to generate publicity — even though some of it makes the intended audience go “what the heck?” or “Ewwww!”
But what Rose is really good at is framing talking points and campaign slogans with instant emotional appeal that might, or might not, stand up to critical examination.
Today’s news release is an example of this. Parker (via Rose) wants to tap into widespread Republican opposition to Gov. Jan Brewer’s proposed temporary sales tax increase. Parker’s statement says Brewer wants to raise this tax before even reducing her own staff:
“Many Arizonans are suffering. Many state agencies are cutting. The Governor’s Office should do the same. I will,” Parker said. “Should I be fortunate enough to be elected Governor I would make these necessary cuts on Day One.”
Parker goes on to say, as Paradise Valley mayor, he has cut the town’s spending by 25 percent and the budget for mayor and Town Council by 54 percent. What Parker doesn’t mention is any reference to what those cuts were or how they might translate to the governor’s office. It’s important to note that the Paradise Valley mayor and council combined spent $83,108 last year and will spend $50,175 this year, a far cry from the $7.6 million set aside for the governor’s office this year.
Also, Parker’s math is a little fuzzy. Paradise Valley’s tax revenues are projected to be down by 25 percent from when Parker became mayor in June 2008 ($21.9 million to $16.3 million). But town operations will spend 16.4 percent less ($19.5 million to $16.3 million). The spending-to-revenue gap of nearly 9 percent will be filled with cash-on-hand saved from past tax collections. A similar savings account for the state was drained dry in January.
Parker also doesn’t mention a single position in the governor’s office that he would eliminate or any specific cost savings he would pursue.
Oddly enough, Parker (via Rose) could have made a stronger statement simply by highlighting the budget numbers for the governor’s office, which have risen by nearly $210,000 from last year as explained by the Legislature’s official budget summary. This stands in contrast with the state agencies that Brewer oversees, which have undergone at least three rounds of budget reductions and have been asked to prepare for another 15 to 20 percent in cuts mid-year. Parker’s news release includes a web link to the governor’s office budget, but fails to note the increase in spending.
UPDATE: Brewer’s press secretary, Paul Senseman, told me by email Wednesday morning that the governor’s office needed additional staffing so far this year to comply with tracking and auditing requirements for use of federal stimulus funds. But Senseman added Brewer plans to include mid-year cuts to her office when she sends new budget proposals to the Legislature in the near future.
Posted in: Arizona Legislature • Arizona government • Election issues • Governor • Jan Brewer • Jason Rose • Vernon Parker | 2 Comments »
October 2nd, 2009, 11:53 am by Le Templar
 John Munger of Tucson (left) speaks with Valley media Friday after filing paperwork to campaign for the Republican nomination for governor (Photo by Capitol Media Services). Tucson lawyer John Munger made official this morning what’s been expected for months: he’s running for governor. Unlike the other major player willing to challenge Gov. Jan Brewer so far, Munger became a formal candidate after submitting his paperwork today to the Secretary of State’s Office.
The former chairman of Arizona Republican Party actually has been on the campaign trail since early in this year, when he established an independent expenditure group called Imagine Arizona. That move allowed him to raise money to pay for an issues web site, to write guest columns and to travel around the state speaking to various groups, all without disclosing his election plans until this week. In fact, Munger has got to be the most active candidate for any statewide office (who’s not already holding such an office) up to this point.
Of course, Munger needed that extra groundwork as he has a significant disadvantage: He’s from Tucson, which much of the state views as reliable territory for the Democratic Party despite its sizable pockets of Republican enclaves. However, Munger is well-known among Republicans for his leadership activities which included helping to manage John McCain’s Arizona team during the 2008 presidential election.
While Imagine Arizona was touted as a wide-ranging public policy forum, Munger’s most detailed analysis has been on health care reform. He has articulated a rather robust answer to Democratic plans in Washington that Arizona could pursue in a constructive fashion that certainly should be appealing to conservatives or moderates, but not libertarians.
What Munger lacks is any detailed explanation for how he would handle Arizona’s huge budget problems. That issue is going to dominate next year’s campaign, and one active political commenter has a great point about anyone who wants to run for this office should enter the race with some idea of what they would do.
Posted in: Arizona secretary of state • Election issues • Governor • 2010 election • Jan Brewer • John Munger • Vernon Parker | Post a Comment »
September 29th, 2009, 3:37 pm by Le Templar
Can we start referring to Attorney General Terry Goddard as the early front runner in next year’s governor’s race? A national political poll released today, the second in less than a week, shows Arizona voters favor Goddard over Republican incumbent Jan Brewer and at least one other prominent GOP name. As with the previous survey, the new poll from Rasmussen Reports leaves out a number of potential Republican contenders, so these results are in no way predictive of what will happen next year. Still Democrats are happy to tout Goddard’s standing in these polls as a real trend.
Interestingly, Rasmussen is often cited by Republicans as more reliable than other national polling firms. (Sssh! Don’t tell the GOP that poll founder Scott Rasmussen is a former member of the mainstream media.) So these results should provide more emphasis for Republican insiders to “encourage” Brewer to step aside and let other contenders vie for the 2010 party nomination.
Posted in: Election issues • Governor • 2010 elections • Jan Brewer • Rasmussen Reports • Terry Goddard | 1 Comment »
September 23rd, 2009, 3:06 pm by Le Templar
In a sign that Arizona politics continues to attract national interest, a Democratic political pollster based in Raleigh, N.C., is rolling out a series of quick turnaround voter surveys related to 2010 statewide elections. Results released today from Public Policy Polling shows Arizona voters currently favor Democrat and Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard to be the next governor over Republican incumbent Jan Brewer and two other GOP big names: state Treasurer Dean Martin and former Gov. Fife Symington. (Paradise Valley Mayor Vernon Parker, who is formally announcing his move into the race tonight, wasn’t offered as a choice.)
On Tuesday, the same firm released polling numbers about President Barack Obama and potential Republican challengers in 2012.
Spokesman Tom Jensen said told me his firm is looking at the political climate in various states across the U.S. this fall where there’s expected to be hot races for U.S. senator and governor in 2010. This week happens to be Arizona’s turn. The firm is covering the costs of these polls out of its own pocket, presumably to drum up publicity and to attract individual candidates as clients.
Jensen said the firm will release survey details Thursday about potential Democratic challengers to Sen. John McCain (Janet Napolitano?). On Friday, it will have a closer look at possible Republican primary match-ups.
Public Policy Polling is upfront about its political leanings but insists that it focuses on honest results. The firm doesn’t have much experience in Arizona. Jensen told me its pollsters first sampled state voters in August 2008 to see if Barack Obama had any shot at upsetting McCain in his home state during the presidential election. Seeing that McCain had a lead of 12 percentage points, Public Policy Polling didn’t waste any more time here.
McCain’s biggest threat in the 2010 Senate race would be in the Republican primary and not from any Democrats, especially since Napolitano still will be running Homeland Security. But Democrats are eager about Goddard heading their 2010 ticket and potentially elevating other candidates. So Public Policy Polling is back and ringing up registered voters again.
Posted in: Arizona government • Congress • Election issues • 2010 elections • Dean Martin • Fife Symington • Jan Brewer • Public Policy Polling • Terry Goddard • Vernon Parker | Post a Comment »
September 22nd, 2009, 5:12 pm by Le Templar
 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 | 1 Comment »
September 16th, 2009, 3:58 pm by Le Templar
 Jim Ward Some Republicans from Rep. Harry Mitchell’s home district have complained because the Democratic congressman didn’t host any town halls on health care reform or any other topic during the August recess. Mitchell did hold a couple of telephone conference calls with the public that his staff says reached more than 18,000 people. But some people in Congressional District 5 felt cheated because they didn’t get an opportunity to discuss the issue in person with their representative. The people I heard from didn’t want a shouting match. They just wanted to have an honest discussion about what Democrats in Congress have proposed and to hear what Mitchell thinks about it.
Well, Republicans are getting at least part of that wish, as venture capitalist and 2010 congressional candidate Jim Ward is hosting a health care reform forum tonight (Wednesday) at 7 p.m. at the Mustang Library in Scottsdale.
Ward will have on hand a couple of experts: Clint Bolick from the Goldwater Institute and Dr. Eric Novack from Arizonans for Health Care Freedom. Clearly, the panel will be biased against what President Barack Obama has proposed, but the discussion still could get lively.
Posted in: Election issues • 2010 elections • Congressional District 5 • Harry Mitchell • Jim Ward • President Barack Obama • Sonoran Alliance | 1 Comment »
September 15th, 2009, 2:04 pm by Le Templar
 Mitt Romney/Associate Press photo If you believe you should be president, typically you are extremely self-confident and able to dream big. Well, Republican Mitt Romney must have both qualities in spades. Invitations went out to today for a Sept. 30 appearance by Romney here in the Valley to raise money for his Free and Strong America PAC. Romney is offering tickets from $300 to $3,000 for a noon luncheon at Chase Field, home of the Arizona Diamondbacks. Romney is not trying to fill a meeting room or a luxury box, but the entire baseball stadium! Blogger Bill Wyman noted that a sell-out (at $3,000 for each seat) would raise $15 million.
Renting out Chase Field for a political fundraiser might be overly optimistic. Romney has strong political support in Arizona, including Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, state Senate Majority Leader Chuck Gray, R-Mesa, and Mesa real estate developer Wilford Cardon. But this state didn’t figure that prominently in Romney fundraising during the 2008 campaign.
However, Romney hopes to capitalize on his strong, second place finish in the 2008 Arizona presidential primary to home state hero John McCain. Arizona’s senior senator won’t be a factor in 2012, while Romney has been preparing for that race from the day that Barack Obama was declared last year’s winner.
Posted in: Election issues • Presidential campaign • 2012 elections • Chase Field • Chuck Gray • Joe Arpaio • John McCain • Mitt Romney • Wilford Cardon | 1 Comment »
September 8th, 2009, 5:53 pm by Le Templar
Arizona lawmakers and state officials often talk about a constitutional requirement to adopt a balanced budget. That simple statement can be somewhat misleading, because there’s no way to really know if a budget is balanced under the state’s accounting system until the fiscal year is over and there’s a final tally of revenues and expenses.
The state constitution even anticipates a situation in which unpredicted expenses push the state budget out of balance when those tallies come in. Article 9, Section 4 authorizes the Legislature to imposes taxes that cover such potential deficits and also will balance the budget for the next year as well.
A new report from staff for the Joint Legislative Budget Committee makes it clear that the state now is in violation of that provision, and likely a second mandate in Article 9, Section 5, which limits state debt.
The report was prepared in response to Gov. Jan Brewer’s final actions on the 2009-10 budget last week, which included vetoes that bring back a statewide property tax and that restore funding for K-12 education and the Department of Economic Security. In essence, the JBLC report says a 2009-10 budget that was balanced when adopted by the Legislature now is predicted to have $464 million in deficit spending because of Brewer’s vetoes. The Legislature still could act on that problem before June 30 and wipe out the pending deficit.
But the JLBC report also notes that the last fiscal year concluded with a $500 million deficit, despite earlier rounds of funding cuts and other maneuvers. The current budget has no provisions to address that deficit, which also qualifies as debt because the money has been committed and is owed to someone.
Brewer could fix last year’s deficit on her own by directing federal stimulus money to cover it. But that would reduce even further the amount of federal money available in case this year’s budget stays in the red. Don’t even ask about the potential deficits for the next budget on the horizon.
Arizona’s courts have basically ignored the state debt limit for years — allowing state and local governments to enter various borrowing schemes including the sale of bonds and lease-to-purchase of state buildings. My guess is the judges also would treat the ongoing budget deficit as a political problem that can’t be solved with a court ruling.
But it’s still interesting to note that Arizona lawmakers still haven’t accomplished their one official task under the constitution.
Posted in: Arizona Legislature • Arizona government • Congress • Election issues • Governor • Presidential campaign • Arizona Constitution • Jan Brewer • Joint Legislative Budget Committee • state budget | 1 Comment »
September 2nd, 2009, 3:26 pm by Le Templar
 Andrew Thomas (Associated Press Photo) Some Valley media types and critics of Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas keep asking what he’s going to do with a investigative referral today from county Elections Director Karen Osborne, who said in writing there’s probable cause that a ranking member of the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office has violated state campaign finance laws.
But those critics are being silly. Thomas doesn’t have to do a thing, because state Attorney General Terry Goddard already is on the case.
There’s long, torturous story behind Capt. Joel Fox and the SCA, a previously anonymous collection of donors that have become connected to Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s re-election campaign in 2008. The Tribune covered some of the facts behind the case earlier this year, but the Phoenix New Times has provided the most thorough coverage, if somewhat slanted against Fox and the sheriff’s office. The case boils down to this:
In 2006, Fox set up a private, unregistered group to gather funds for some type of publicity to defend the sheriff’s office from what Fox calls unfair criticism. But Fox never actually spent those funds. Then in 2008, Fox gave $105,000 to the state Republican Party, which Fox said was because the donors wanted the money put to some purpose and he didn’t know what else to do with it. Fox says he never told the Republican Party how to use the cash.
But the state Democratic Party claimed the SCA donation was used to fund a pair of campaign ads against Thomas and Apraio that were sponsored by a GOP-created political action committee. The Republican Party also denied any connection, but returned the $105,000 to SCA after Fox refused to disclose who donated to his group.
Both state and the county election officials determined that whatever Fox’s original intent, his group became a political action committee when it made a political contribution. Fox fought the county for months, but finally turned over SCA records to avoid a $315,000 fine. Meanwhile, Goddard’s office quietly served a search warrant in March also looking for SCA records. That search warrant was only recently revealed and was unsealed Monday.
Osborne said today that the records and donor checks point to specific violations of state law, such as donations offered to a political party that are “earmarked” to help a specific candidate.
Once an election official determines there’s probable cause a campaign violation exists, the case is turned over to the relevant state or county prosecutor, who then decides whether to actually impose a fine or to seek criminal sanctions. Osborne has turned the Fox case over to Thomas’ office.
But Thomas doesn’t have to do anything. If he’s smart, Thomas will sit on the case and await the outcome of the separate Goddard investigation. When questioned about it, Thomas might even argue that’s a good use of taxpayer resources. Why should two levels of government be investigating the same person for possible violations of the same set of statutes?
Any political fallout would land on Goddard’s shoulders, and Thomas doesn’t have to risk angering Arpaio or his top lieutenants as Thomas considers running for attorney general next year.
Posted in: Election issues • Andrew Thomas • Joe Arpaio • Joel Fox • Karen Osborne • Maricopa County elections | Post a Comment »
September 1st, 2009, 7:27 pm by Le Templar
 Randy Pullen Randy Pullen, chairman of the Arizona Republican Party, has called a news conference Wednesday at which he plans to demand a state special prosecutor be appointed to investigate whether certain state officials such as Attorney General Terry Goddard and Rep. Kyrsten Sinema (both Democratic leaders) have violated the state’s “resign to run” law by openly talking about their plans to campaign for another office in 2010. I welcome Pullen bringing public attention to this issue, to the extent that Arizona should decide whether to enforce this law, or dump it and let our politicians speak freely to us about their career paths.
But I do have a couple of questions I hope to ask Pullen:
1. Violating the “resign to run” law isn’t a crime, which usually is the only reason to consider appointing a special prosecutor (as the title implies). Obviously, Goddard can’t investigate himself. But why couldn’t one of Arizona’s 15 county attorneys investigate, as they have exact same authority as the attorney general to enforce state statutes?
2. For a truly objective investigation, should any and all possible violations that have been identified be part of the special prosecutor’s charge, including those involving Republican officials?
Posted in: Election issues • John Huppenthal • Kyrsten Sinema • Randy Pullen • Terry Goddard | 1 Comment »
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