By Staff Reporter |

Arizona’s public utilities governing body is exploring its options for legal action against Attorney General Kris Mayes. 

The Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC) accused Mayes of illegally impeding its ratemaking authority for political gain. Mayes is running for reelection. Although she has no primary candidates, she will either have to face off against one of two Republicans: Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen (R-LD14) or Air Force reservist prosecutor Rodney Glassman. 

As part of a commission press release sent out on Monday, ACC Chairman Nick Myers issued a statement saying the ACC had to “force” Mayes to fulfill her attorney general duties toward the commission. 

“She was unlawfully pocket vetoing our commission ratemaking authority by delaying the process pertaining to the repeal of the natural gas subsidies,” said Myers. 

Myers also accused Mayes of “play[ing] politics,” naming Mayes’ disapproval of the ACC’s appeal of the Renewable Energy Standard and Tariff (REST) rules. The ACC submitted that appeal and one other for the Gas Utility Energy Efficiency Standard (Gas EE) rules to Mayes’ office for review. 

“These costly mandates forced Arizona ratepayers to pay almost $4 billion more than they should have over the last 20 years,” said Myers. “The commission will continue to protect the ratepayers and will not allow the Attorney General to arbitrarily increase rates against the decision of the commission.”

In 2006, the ACC gave utility companies a new mandate through the establishment of the REST rules: generate 15 percent of their energy from renewable resources by 2025, and submit annual implementation plans describing compliance. Mayes was on the commission at the time. 

The ACC unanimously voted to repeal the REST rules in March, citing in part a $2.3 billion financial burden for compliance passed on to customers through surcharges.

The ACC said in its most recent press release that Mayes had gone beyond her statutory authority — which they described as ministerial — since she had conducted a substantive review of ACC’s ratemaking rules authority. ACC contends their ratemaking rules authority is constitutionally exclusive and leaves no room for interpretation by the attorney general. 

In her denial of the ACC appeal, Mayes claimed in a letter to the commission that it had violated its own rulemaking procedures. The commission denied this assessment and accused Mayes of vetoing rulemaking based on policy disagreement. 

Mayes approved those impacted rules which mandated renewable energies while she was on the ACC. 

The ACC called these “unnecessary subsidies,” and claimed Mayes’ denial of the rule appeal was a cover for her alleged ulterior motive: preventing the ACC from undoing her work to push renewables. 

“As a commissioner, Kris Mayes voted for these expensive subsidies that have cost ratepayers billions of dollars,” said Commissioner Kevin Thompson. “It is an abuse of her position as Attorney General to use the ministerial rule approval process to substantively veto our lawfully enacted ratemaking rule repeal.  Every day that goes by, she is responsible for increasing costs on ratepayers.”

This is the latest development in an ongoing power struggle between Mayes and the ACC.

Back in 2024, Mayes sued the ACC over its decision to reverse a Power Plant and Transmission Line Siting Committee order regarding environmental oversight for a UniSource Energy power plant project. A superior court judge ruled against the ACC last October.

And in April, Mayes hit the ACC with three rehearing requests for three different alleged issues.

Mayes spokesman Richie Taylor told the Arizona Capitol Times that Mayes had to take on ACC responsibilities because the ACC was giving “sweetheart deals” to data centers while raising utility rates on senior citizens.

“Chairman Myers should focus on fulfilling the constitutional obligations of the Commission on behalf of Arizonans so the Attorney General doesn’t have to step in and do it for them,” said Taylor.

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