The AZ Political Podcast

KTAR News 92.3
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The AZ Political Podcast takes a look at the latest news and state of politics in Arizona. KTAR News' Jim Sharpe, also host of Arizona's Morning News, speaks with newsmakers each week plus gives his insight. 

  1. 3d ago

    Johnathan Nez, CD2 candidate and former President of the Navajo Nation

    Democrat Jonathan Nez told me on this week’s AZ Political Podcast that a lot has changed since the fall of 2024. I’m pretty sure Nez is hoping that a lot of that change took place in the minds of Arizona’s 2nd Congressional District (CD2) voters.    2024 is the first time that Nez, the former president of the Navajo Nation, ran to replace Republican Congressman Eli Crane in Arizona’s 2nd Congressional District. Since the outcome of that election saw Crane win by a 54.5% to 45.5% margin, I’ll bet Nez is hoping 2024 will be the first — and the last — time he loses.   Some numbers are certainly favoring Nez more this year: According to a late August poll by Democratic firm GBAO Strategies, Crane only has a two-point advantage (46% to 44%) over Nez — putting them in a statistical tie.   However, other numbers don’t break Nez’s way, like party registration. CD2 is 39% Republican, 27% Democrat and 31% independent (no party designated). But, that GBAO poll shows Nez with a 22-point advantage amongst independents.   Nez told me about another thing that’s changed. “In the last cycle, I didn’t get any party support; it was grassroots,” but the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) has come through with ad support this year.   Good thing for Nez, too, because the Federal Elections Commission report filed just before the Primary Election showed that Crane had raised almost $9.5 million — putting him at #14 among all House candidates nationwide. Meanwhile, Nez’s $3.5 ranked him at 125th.    That’s not a lot of money to cover a lot of ground — which CD2 has in spades. The 10th largest congressional district in the country, CD2 covers the entirety of five counties and parts of four others — and is more than 300 miles long from top to bottom.   And since we are on the topic of money, let’s finish there — because money is what Nez is banking on to be the top-of-mind topic for voters. And the issue that could create a different outcome in this election cycle. Because Nez believes the difference in affordability of living life now, versus two years ago (when he lost to Crane), will make all the difference in his race versus Crane this time around.

  2. Oct 7

    Susan Winder, John Crow and Ryan Caracciolo, Maricopa Community College Board candidates

    I’m glad that my guests this week on the AZ Political Podcast didn’t take offense when I told them that, normally, I wouldn’t have you people on the podcast.   Not very PC — but what I meant was that John Crow, Ryan Carraciolo and Susan Winder are not candidates for an office that would normally rise to the level of awareness for most voters. In fact, their races are so downballot they are almost on the floor.    Listed after local school district bond measures on the ballot and barely above where you vote on about 5000 judges are the candidates running for… the Maricopa County Community College District (MCCCD) Board.   I made an exception for these candidates because Crow, Carraciolo and Winder are doing things a bit differently: they’re running as a team — and their number one platform is the desire to bring the team sport of football back to the Valley’s junior colleges.    And they are running a sophisticated ad campaign featuring Super Bowl-winning quarterback Donovan McNabb and ASU Head Coach Kenny Dillingham to convince people to “bring it back.”   Football went bye-bye as a school sport at Phoenix College, Scottsdale Community College, Mesa Community College and Glendale Community College after the 2018 season.   Not only do they think that’s wrong, they think the way junior college football was eliminated was wrong: They say the MCCCD board never voted on it — the decision was made by the district’s chancellor and individual school presidents.   Crow, who is an executive for a family of companies specializing mostly in real estate, credits playing football at Phoenix College as changing the trajectory of his life.   “I got out of high school and I had no direction… no idea what I wanted to be and thank goodness there was a junior college program for football because that’s the one thing I knew and liked. I went to play for Phoenix College.    “It gave me two years to be around good men with lots of discipline and a team environment and just gave me that time I needed to really develop to see who I could become.”   Crow, Carraciolo and Winder aren’t solely focused on football — that’s just the angle that gets them in the door with voters. They also want to “aggressively expand training for healthcare careers” to fill what they say are the annual 4,800 registered nurse openings, 3,600 openings for medical assistants, and nearly 15,000 openings for home health and personal care aides in Arizona.    And in order to help fill 20,000 new construction and trades jobs by 2030, they want to expand MCCCD’s two-year degrees, industry certifications, apprenticeships and accelerated specialized training.   Let’s see if they can get all that over the goal line — using football as the lure to draw voters in.

  3. Oct 1

    Alexander Kolodin, candidate for Secretary of State

    During the AZ Political Podcast, Alexander Kolodin, the Republican nominee for Arizona Secretary of State, doubled down on the most contentious claim made in his debate with Democratic incumbent Adrain Fontes: that Fontes was a “lawyer for the Sinaloa drug cartel.”   Here are the facts: In 2011, Fontes represented Manuel Celis-Acosta as a defense attorney after Celis-Acosta was accused of selling firearms to Mexican drug cartels — one of the cases that stemmed from Operation Fast and Furious, a botched federal law enforcement action attempting to follow straw gun purchases into Mexico.   While Celis-Acosta certainly did business with cartel associates, he wasn’t considered a cartel member by the ATF, the DEA or federal prosecutors.    But I digress — because Arizona’s Secretary of State doesn’t focus on cartels or gun purchases — but it certainly does a lot with elections. And in that regard, Kolodin and I talked a lot about that topic, especially early and mail-in voting.    Problem is, I never found out how he really feels about mailing in your ballot.   He told me he wants to replace signature verification of mail-in ballots with an “objective standard” because the current process is "bordering on a constitutional issue" — viewing it as a disadvantage to voters whose signatures change over time.   Instead, Kolodin would like to see residents issued an early-voter ID number — specifically for early voters.    I don’t know if his desire to reform mail-in voting is a sign that he’s in favor of keeping it, but he didn’t answer me directly about whether he'd like to see mail-in voting eliminated, as President Trump has said he wants.   Instead, he mentioned a law (he takes credit for) that let early voters returning their ballots in person show ID in order to bypass the signature verification process. Something he credits for faster primary results.   He also wouldn't say whether he believed the 2020 election fraud claims he presented in court as an election attorney. Claims that got him in trouble with the State Bar and the state Supreme Court.    When I read the lawsuit's claim that Democrat Katie Hobbs (who was secretary of state at the time) and Republican Doug Ducey (Arizona’s governor in 2020) "engaged in massive election fraud for the purpose of… manipulating the vote count to manufacture an election of Joe Biden", Kolodin claimed “that's not what we said.”   When I simplified my question to, “OK, but did you believe that?” He said again, “That's not what we said. What we wanted to do is make sure that every lawful Arizonan had their vote counted.”   When it comes to counting, I hope you feel like you can count on me to ask the questions. I just wish you could also count on me to guarantee you an answer. But that one is out of my control.

  4. Sep 24

    Adrian Fontes, Arizona Secretary of State

    Incumbent Democratic Secretary of State Adrian Fontes believes that letting his Republican opponent, state Rep. Alexander Kolodin, win in November (becoming chief elections officer for Arizona) would be tantamount to handing the “keys of the kingdom to the weirdos.”   Fontes, my guest on this week’s AZ Political Podcast, says that Kolodin “doesn’t want to reform elections; he wants to upset the apple cart. He wants to force every Arizonan to stand in line to vote. He hates voting by mail.”   To back up his assertion, Fontes says that, during every session Kolodin has served in the Legislature, he’s “introduced legislation or supported legislation to kill voting by mail.    “This is a guy who authored Prop 144… that effectively erases your ability to vote by mail… [but] doesn’t exactly say that because he’s one of those sneaky lawyer types that’ll do that and he’s been known to misrepresent things.”    Fontes says that voters have lost confidence in our elections systems because of “people like Alex Kolodin lying about poll workers, lying about temporary workers in our warehouses, lying about our local elections officials” and he adds that attempts by Kolodin and others to prove election chicanery “haven’t ever proven anything.”    As far as the campaign trail goes, Fontes, who grew up in rural Nogales, Arizona, says he’s tried to hit as many parts of the state as he can during his reelection bid — visiting all of the state’s 15 counties before the primary. And it’s what he says he’ll keep doing through Election Day: visiting Arizona, end to end.    Although, I have my doubts as to whether Fontes will visit the spot I’ve asked every statewide candidate about: Littlefield, Arizona.    In all fairness, because Littlefield is located in the furthermost (northwestern) corner of the state; it’s small enough (population: 256) to be named “Tinyfield;” and you have to go through Nevada or Utah to access it by car (and his campaign can’t afford its own chopper); I didn’t make Fontes “campaign promise” to campaign there.

  5. Sep 10

    Howie Fischer, Capitol Media Services Chief Correspondent

    You probably shouldn’t watch the entire AZ Political Podcast while you're in the voting booth on November 3, but this episode might be good to watch before you vote so you’ll know at least a little about each of the eight propositions you’ll find on your ballot this fall.   For something more in-depth, consider attending KTAR’s “The Issues That Matter Town Hall” on the evening of September 15 at Western Spirit: Scottsdale’s Museum of the West. You can join LaDona Harvey, Mike Broomhead, experts and local leaders, and… me!  Reserve your (free) spot through KTAR News’ partner Arizona Talks.     But back to the AZ Political Podcast, where Capitol Media Service’s Howie Fischer, who’s covered the Legislature since the ‘80s, goes through each prop with me, revealing the ones he thinks are designed to make our lives better and the ones designed to make Gov. Katie Hobbs look bad — by putting bills she vetoed in front of voters to approve.   And, yes, there are props on this year’s ballot that are designed to do both.   And there are bills that, while carefully designed, can have unintended consequences.    The props, if approved, would do a lot of different things, like:   • Prohibit the government from taxing you based on how much you drive;   • Stop local governments from taxing food sales — without voter approval;   • Forbid schools from allowing people to use a restroom, locker room, or shower area not designated for their (at-birth) sex;   • Ban non-voter-approved traffic photo enforcement systems (a bi-partisan favorite, by the way); and,   • Require most non-rural school districts to spend at least 60% of their budget on “direct instructional expenses.” Interestingly, non-compliance would leave districts with even less money to use anywhere.   I hope you take the time to watch the “Proposition Primer Edition” of the AZ Political Podcast. Just, please, don’t watch it in the voting booth — or while driving a motor vehicle.    That’s something that’s already prohibited by law.

  6. Sep 2

    Paul Bentz, Vice President of Research at Highground Inc.

    How is it possible that Republicans are the ones with a big registration advantage in Arizona, yet it’s a Democrat — Gov. Katie Hobbs — who has the advantage over Republican Congressman Andy Biggs in the race for governor?   This week on the AZ Political Podcast, we pause our parade of politicos to take a look at what you think of the candidates — by peering through a polling lens with Paul Bentz, the vice president of research at political firm Highground Inc.   While Highground’s latest poll shows Hobbs up by 15 percentage points over Biggs — including sizable leads among female (28%) and independent (35%) voters — Paul believes Hobbs’ lead will shrink as we get closer to Election Day. Whether Biggs can hit the finish line with a win depends on his ability to coalesce Arizona Republicans while convincing some independents to come along for the ride.   Currently, only 70 percent of GOP voters back Biggs. The remaining Republicans are divided between the undecideds (14%) and the GOP-ers that Hobbs has in her corner (12%).    Meanwhile, Hobbs enjoys 93 percent support among Democrats.   We also get a chance to look at the favorability ratings of candidates and leaders — from Hobbs and Biggs all the way to the nation’s tippy-top: Trump. And we take a look at how much he’s helping (or hurting) candidates in our state.   No matter which candidates you plan to choose this fall (and whether or not you think your mind can be changed) I hope you choose to catch the AZ Political Podcast — available at KTAR.com, the KTAR News app and everywhere you get your podcasts.

  7. Aug 24

    Jay Feely, GOP candidate for Congressional District 1

    Republican Jay Feely didn’t call his opponent in Arizona’s 1st Congressional District (CD-1), Dr. Amish Shah, a Democratic Socialist — but Feely did pretty much tell me on the AZ Political Podcast that Shah looks, walks and quacks an awful lot like one.    And says it’s “on him (Shah) to say ‘I don’t believe in those policies.’ He hasn’t done it.”    Feely points to Shah campaigning with, and for, Bernie Sanders and having “donated to these groups that advocate for those very policies… well over $30,000 to these groups and you articulate for these groups… the policies that those groups advocate for” as evidence of Shah’s socialist walking and quacking.    But here’s something that’s nice to hear as we head into what will surely be a hard-fought fall in CD-1: While saying that Shah should own up to his socialism, Feely doesn’t go as far as many Republicans in criticizing the people behind the policies.    Feely believes that the Democratic Party policies that he sees as being ineffective — or even making the problem worse— are born with good intent. That’s far different from many in the GOP who I’ve heard suggest that Democratic Party policies are designed to destroy America.   Jay Feely has no desire to get personal or down-and-dirty in the General Election. He got enough of that in the Primary.   He explains: “In the primaries... you're running against people that have similar beliefs, so it becomes very personal because if they're gonna beat you, they're gonna knock you down.” And he says he had to laugh because "right before the primary I was 'not a true Republican', I was a 'gun grabber', I was a 'Bill Clinton lover'… and then as soon as I win the primary, now I'm a MAGA extreme! You know, which one is it?”    I will leave “how MAGA” Jay Feely is, up to you, but when I asked him if he was trying to distance himself from President Trump’s endorsement (which helped him win the Primary but might be a liability in the General Election), Feely said: “I think what voters want most of all is transparency. So, they don't want you to be one way in the primary and then shift and be a different person with different ideals in the General. They want somebody who's gonna be honest about ‘hey this is who I am.’    “So, I'm not gonna try to pretend that President Trump didn't give me an endorsement and that we haven't been friends for the last two decades.” In fact, Feely sees that friendship as an advantage — especially when his viewpoints differ from the President's.   “I've talked to him about water over the last month… saying 'this isn’t a fair [Colorado River] deal for Arizona when the Upper Basin and those states aren't willing to make cuts' and trying to really advocate for our state.   “One of the advantages that I have is the ability to go and communicate with our president and talk to him because we have a friendship.”    A friendship, by the way, that was founded and fostered around golf — which is also something that serves as a sign that you can take the athlete out of the fight but you can’t take the fight out of the athlete: Jay Feely says he always tries to win when he plays the President — fighting spirit that could serve Feely well between now and Nov. 3.

  8. Aug 18

    Kris Mayes, Arizona Attorney General

    All I could get incumbent Attorney General Kris Mayes (D) to say about an investigative interview her office is seeking with Gov. Katie Hobbs (D), is that it’s Mayes’ “hope that we get all the answers we need from the governor’s office.”    The investigation surrounds allegations of a play-to-play scheme where Sunshine Residential Homes received a substantial rate increase from the Hobbs administration to operate foster care group homes after Sunshine donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Hobbs’ inaugural fund and the state Democratic Party.   When I asked Mayes, my guest this week on the AZ Political Podcast, about the timeline of her office’s investigation, she told me, “We're moving deliberately as we can to get it completed.    “The way I handle all these cases — including the really high-profile ones — is I leave it to the investigators and our prosecutors… to complete the case and to tell me when they’re done. I don’t think it’s my job to rush anything.”   What if that doesn’t happen before the election? Is she worried that if the results don’t favor Hobbs, she’ll be accused of trying to protect a fellow Democrat?    It doesn’t sound like it: “We have prosecuted Democrats. We have prosecuted Republicans [and] independents. We’re going to call this as we see it. Wherever the facts lead us. That’s always the way I have operated.   “What letter is behind somebody’s name never factors into one of our investigations.”    By the way, Mayes and I talk about topics other than the governor — although, mentioning Hobbs’ unwillingness to debate her Republican opponent, Andy Biggs, prompted Mayes to assure me she will definitely debate her Republican opponent, Warren Petersen (my guest last week on the podcast).     Speaking of Republicans, we also discuss her former status as a Republican and which of her conservative principles migrated over when she switched to Democrat in 2019 and how they’ve colored her work as AG.    Also on this AZ Political Podcast:   •  Mayes’ latest lawsuit against tariffs, her winning percentage vs. the Trump Administration in court, and whether she regrets filing any of the more-than two dozen lawsuits she’s filed against the President   •  Her office joining a multi-state lawsuit against Facebook and Instagram operator Meta that could result in a $1 trillion+ judgment   •  If the AG’s office should play a role in combatting illegal immigration   •  Why she left a career in journalism to pursue a law degree and enter politics    That’s a path I definitely don’t see for myself. I enjoy doing the AZ Political Podcast way too much.

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The AZ Political Podcast takes a look at the latest news and state of politics in Arizona. KTAR News' Jim Sharpe, also host of Arizona's Morning News, speaks with newsmakers each week plus gives his insight. 

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