by Staff Reporter | Sep 17, 2024 | Economy, News
By Staff Reporter |
An exclusive poll for AZ Free News conducted by Data Orbital shows that among likely voters in the November 2024 General Election, President Donald Trump holds a narrow edge on Vice President and Democrat-appointed nominee Kamala Harris. Taken between 9/7/2024 – 9/9/2024, the poll shows Trump leading by a margin of 0.2% with 46.2% of those polled against Harris’ 46%, with a 4.26% margin of error.
Remarkably, the poll shows approximately 7.7% of Arizona voters remain undecided or refused to answer and are theoretically up for grabs in the highly competitive swing-state race.
Speaking with AZ Free News, George Khalaf, President of Data Orbital, explained, “Independent voters are always going to be very close, so they were. It was still neck and neck depending on the survey. The results sort of oscillate in terms of who’s in the lead.”
“That 7.7% undecided number, I would say, is going to be one of two things: 1.) Either individuals that are saying that they are likely to vote but don’t end up voting or 2.) People that really are truly undecided. But I would be shocked if the true undecided number is in the high single digits,” explained Khalaf.
“I would guess that right now, the true percentage of people that are undecided is maybe one or two percent, if that. This is a high-profile race and so most people have made up their minds. But I think a portion of people that are undecided likely will not end up making a decision on November 5th,” Khalaf stated. “And even if they come out and vote, they may just not vote in the presidential election or will write in somebody random.”
When polled on the most important issues facing Arizona, 30.4% of the likely votes said “Economy, Inflation, Cost of living,” 28.7% selected the Border and Immigration, and at a distant third selection, 18.3% said “Abortion/Pro-Choice/Women’s Rights.”
Conversely, Gallup polling from as recently as August found nationally that Immigration dominated as the most important issue at 19% of those polled, followed by the economy overall at 18%, poor government/leadership at 16%, and High Cost of Living/Inflation at 15%. Abortion barely moved the needle at just 4%.
Given that the poll’s results pre-date the Tuesday Sep. 10th Presidential Debate, they do not represent potential changes in perception that followed. However, Rasmussen Reports has offered a more comprehensive dataset with polling through Sep. 12th posted to X on Friday showing Trump ahead by six points, with another six percent undecided.
Pollster Nate Silver has consistently shown Trump to be favored to win the election both before and after the debate with Trump’s electoral college probability, which ignores the popular vote unlike general polling, at 61% based on the outcome of 40,000 election model simulations.
Nate Silver’s latest result is an increase from the 60.6% probability on Sep. 12th and is only a slight dip from the high point on Sep. 8th at 63.8%.
As of this report, Polymarket projection has President Donald Trump favored to win Arizona 61-40% and has Harris leading nationally by just one point. The projection has been fluctuating between the candidates by 1-3 points on a daily basis, with Trump leading by two points as recently as Sep. 11th and tied at 49% on the tenth.
As far as potential shifts in public opinion before the election, Khalaf told AZ Free News, “I don’t think we’re likely to see a large shift. I just think that obviously we all know the limitations of public opinion polling. There is a margin of error. And so I think the race is going to stay consistently in that range, which means that on election day, that’s why people are still saying it’s a toss -up, even though, again, I would say I would give Arizona a lean towards former President Trump, but I don’t expect a big shift. I don’t think that there’s much that could occur.”
Addressing the Sunday attempt on President Donald Trump’s life, he added, “I mean, look, we saw another assassination attempt, or at least that’s what they’re saying right now. They’re investigating an attempted assassination, and even then we’re not even hearing about it nearly as much as the first attempt. And so all that’s to say, there’s just so much information out there. There’s so much information that people are consuming. I’d be shocked if there was a major shift. I think all of the swing states: Arizona is no different.”
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
by Staff Reporter | Sep 15, 2024 | News
By Staff Reporter |
The Arizona Free Enterprise Club (AFEC) is demanding an investigation into an alleged misuse of taxpayer funds by Secretary of State Adrian Fontes.
AFEC published a press release on Tuesday accusing Fontes of misusing taxpayer funds by filing a “politically motivated” brief in the ongoing Arizona Supreme Court case, Smith v. Fontes. The organization also requested that Fontes recuse himself from all ballot tabulation procedures concerning the other initiatives.
“By filing his brief at the Arizona Supreme Court, Fontes unequivocally signaled his position that 40,000 duplicate signatures should be ignored and counted in favor of passing Proposition 140,” said AFEC in its press release. “In short, to Fontes, the ends justify the means to ensure that Arizona’s elections system can be operated like California’s radical system.”
AFEC and other critics compare the components within Proposition 140 to current election procedures exercised by California.
Proposition 140 seeks to remove the partisan split in primary voting — instead implementing open, or “jungle,” primaries — and determine winners using ranked-choice voting. Ranked-choice voting allows voters to rank their preferred candidates each election until one candidate accrues over 50 percent of the vote.
That claim of political motivation stems from Fontes’ role as a “team member” for the nonprofit organization (Save Democracy) supporting the political action committee (Make Elections Fair Arizona) pushing Proposition 140. Those two entities are also united by the involvement of Sarah Smallhouse as their president and treasurer, respectively: a longtime Democrat donor from Tucson who served as leadership for a University of Arizona board and the Southern Arizona Leadership Council.
Fontes’ brief petitioned the court to count any votes cast for Proposition 140, even if the ongoing review of the ballot-qualifying signatures determined that there weren’t enough signatures gathered. Fontes argued that the proposition should be considered valid since the ballots were already being printed with the contested proposition on them.
“Once the ballots have gone to print, it is in the hands of Arizona’s voters,” said Fontes. “The person contesting an issue (or candidate) can make a case to the voters, but the Courts cannot usurp the voters’ decision once it goes to them.”
AFEC sued to stop Proposition 140 earlier this summer after reportedly discovering that over half of the gathered signatures were in violation of state law — around 40,000 duplicates. Should all those alleged duplicate signatures be removed, the proposition would lack the number of signatures required to qualify for the ballot.
AFEC President Scot Mussi said in a statement that Fontes’ brief amounted to the secretary of state taking a side in a ballot measure rather than maintaining an impartial role in the elections process.
“Far from acting as a fair and impartial elections chief, Fontes has officially taken a side in a controversial measure that would be potentially on the ballot, showing Arizonans that he is using taxpayer dollars to make the case for a California-style amendment that would fundamentally transform the way we vote and select our candidates for public office,” said Mussi. “This is not saving democracy; this is trampling the will of the people and the laws that govern how elections should be executed.”
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
by Staff Reporter | Sep 14, 2024 | News
By Staff Reporter |
Attorney General Kris Mayes has been asked to investigate the city of Surprise over its alleged violation of one citizen’s free speech rights.
Republican State Senator John Kavanagh sent a letter to Mayes on Tuesday requesting an investigation into the arrest of a Surprise citizen after criticizing the city attorney during a city council meeting last month. The arrested citizen, Rebekah Massie, sued the city of Surprise last week with the aid of Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE).
Mayor Skip Hall, who ordered Massie’s removal, cited city policy prohibiting public comment from lodging any “charges or complaints” against city employees or elected officials.
State law requires the attorney general to investigate local governmental ordinances, regulations, orders, or other official actions alleged to be in violation of the state law or Arizona Constitution. Under this law, Mayes’ office would have to issue a written report of their findings within 30 days of receiving the investigation request.
In a press release, Kavanagh claimed that the city of Surprise had violated both state law and the Constitution with Massie’s arrest.
“In Arizona statutes, we have a provision that specifically says, ‘[a] public body may make an open call to the public during a public meeting, subject to reasonable time, place and manner restrictions, to allow individuals to address the public body on any issue within the jurisdiction of the public body,’” said Kavanagh. “Protecting freedom of speech, especially in public government settings, is incredibly important to our democracy. Regardless of where they stand, members of the public deserve the opportunity to voice their opinions and concerns to city leaders.”
Kavanagh’s letter to Mayes asked the attorney general’s office to investigate whether the city of Surprise’s policy restricting public speech by prohibiting complaints against city employees and elected officials violates the Arizona Constitution and state law governing public comment within public meetings.
Were Mayes to determine that the city of Surprise’s public comment policy violates state law or the Arizona Constitution, her office would provide notice to the city by mail of its violation and give the city a 30-day deadline to resolve the violation. Should the city fail to resolve the violation, Mayes would notify the state treasurer to withhold and redistribute state shared funds.
Or, were Mayes to determine that the city’s public comment policy may violate certain state law or the Arizona Constitution, the attorney general would file a special action in the state Supreme Court to seek a resolution. The court would then require the city to post a bond equal to the amount of state shared revenues paid to the city in the last six months.
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
by Staff Reporter | Sep 13, 2024 | News
By Staff Reporter |
With the election drawing near, Democratic congressional candidate Kirsten Engel is admitting more often that the situation at the border constitutes a crisis.
Engel initially denied the existence of any crisis at the border for several years after leaving the State Senate to launch her first congressional run in 2021. In a NOTUS article published on Monday, reporters took away from their interview with Engel that she maintained that same perspective until her campaign asked for a correction.
“She has refrained from calling the situation on the border a ‘crisis,’” read the initial reporting. “Engel told NOTUS she didn’t feel her own campaign was shifting much from her last run.”
The correction simply deleted that first statement and quoted to readers the opening line of an opinion piece she wrote for the Arizona Republic in February. However, the Engel campaign also maintained that she wasn’t shifting policy positions much from her first run.
“Arizona Democrat Kirsten Engel has referred to the situation at the border as a ‘crisis’ during her 2024 campaign,” read the correction. “This run, she’s emphasized how important issues at the border are repeatedly, penning an op-ed that said ‘for far too long, southern Arizona has shouldered the brunt of our nation’s border crisis.’”
As part of her last run, Engel signaled support for bringing an end to Title 42, which expelled illegal immigrants back to the country from which they entered the United States. These expulsions lasted from March 2020 and ended in May 2023 according to the Customs and Border Protection.
Engel said in 2022 that the massive uptick of illegal immigrants didn’t constitute a crisis.
Engel’s platform this go around mentions increasing manpower, technology, and security measures at the border. This part of her platform doesn’t mention building the last of the wall along the border, a security measure she criticized as outdated during her last campaign.
The bulk of that opinion piece criticized her opponent, incumbent Republican Juan Ciscomani, for refusing to back the $118 billion foreign aid bill which, in part, provided funding for the border ($20 billion). The main purpose of the bill was to provide additional funding for Ukraine — $60 billion — with the remainder allocated to other humanitarian aid and conflicts overseas.
Leading authorities on the border, such as the National Border Patrol Council, gave reluctant support for the foreign aid bill. That authority’s president, Brandon Judd, said that the Biden administration’s border policy had forced them to accept anything in the way of promising border security.
The $118 billion foreign aid bill was styled as a bipartisan bill because of its formation by independent Senator Kirsten Sinema, along with Republican Senators James Lankford of Oklahoma and Chris Murphy of Connecticut.
Ciscomani has made use of Engel’s repeated past denials of the border crisis in campaign material. The border is a top issue of concern for voters. A poll released last week by Noble Predictive Insights found that over half of voters (63 percent) supported increased border security measures, namely Proposition 314 — the “Immigration and Border Law Enforcement Measure” that would allow state and local law enforcement to arrest those who violate migration laws as well as allow state judges to issue deportation orders.
Unlike Engel, Ciscomani’s policy platform does advocate for building the remainder of the border wall. Ciscomani also supports ending the catch and release practice of illegal immigrants, ending the exploitation of parole authority, reinstating former President Donald Trump’s “Remain in Mexico” program, and expanding expedited removal authority.
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
by Staff Reporter | Sep 11, 2024 | Education, News
By Staff Reporter |
A Scottsdale-area mom is hoping that her success and positions on a local school district governing board will convince voters to elect her to the Arizona State Senate.
Carine Werner is currently running to represent Arizona Legislative District 4 in the state senate. She is an immigrant and small business owner, looking “to address the problems we face and help us protect the community we love together.”
Currently, Werner serves on the Scottsdale Unified School District Governing Board, where she has gained valuable experience for a potential move to the state Senate. In 2022, Werner gave an interview to the Scottsdale Progress Newspaper to outline her motivations for running for the position she would later assume, and to preview her action items and priorities for office.
She told the paper that she was running for the board because, “having experienced the past few tumultuous years with children in Scottsdale schools, I know the frustration and pain our students, families, and community experienced. I bring common-sense leadership, an enduring passion for securing our children’s future, respect for parents and teachers, and a skill for building consensus without compromising values.”
Werner then presented six promises to voters and parents of children within the Scottsdale Unified School District. The first was that she would “address parents’ rejection of SUSD.” She made this commitment because “A recent exit survey reveals that parents are concerned about failing academics, politically-charged classrooms, the promotion of ideological and anti-American rhetoric, and that they lack faith in the SUSD administration and the board.”
The Scottsdale mom added, “When I’m on the board, parental input will guide decisions made. I plan to partner with parents to curate the best educational experience for our children.”
The second promise was that she would “reverse enrollment decline and loss of funding.” Werner made this commitment because, “We cannot market our way out of this problem, nor should taxpayers’ foot the bill. We must restore academic excellence, close the achievement gap, and create a culture students will thrive in.”
The third promise was that she would “pay teachers first.” She made this commitment because “Although enrollment is down, SUSD increased administrative staff overhead. The Arizona legislature approved an additional $1 billion in year-over-year education spending, bringing the total K-12 spending for this year to $8.45 billion. In addition, federal funding and property taxes brings that total to $14.88 billion. Governor Ducey called on school board members to ensure these funds are directed to teachers. I commit to using my vote to prioritize those funds for teachers’ salaries and funding our classrooms first.”
The fourth promise was that she would “improve academic performance. Werner made this commitment because “With less than 37% of SUSD 10th graders proficient in math and ELA, a strategy to improve academic scores must be clearly stated, aggressive, and measurable. Yet, SUSD’s strategic development plan treats academics as an afterthought. We must get back to focusing on the basics. My commitment is to ensure that achievement programs will improve student proficiency and mastery of academic standards.”
The fifth promise was that she would “improve student safety.” She made this commitment because, “We must ensure the safety of our schools through support of our valued School Resource Officers, partnerships with the Scottsdale Police Department, and continuous review and improvement of our safety procedures.”
Werner also noted that, “The Arizona Legislature has approved $50 million in ongoing funding for school safety, supporting school resource officer salaries, and $20 million for the school safety interoperability program, which provides funding to county sheriffs for real-time communication solutions between schools and public safety agencies in the event of an emergency.”
The final promise was that she would “remove politics from the classroom.” Werner made this commitment because, “We must develop students’ interests, not identities. Politics and ideological rhetoric should have no place in our classrooms. I will work to remove the divisive curriculum that has been swept into our schools, restoring our education of revered American principles and ensure every student has the opportunity to thrive.”
It was this promise from Werner that led to the most controversy over her efforts to keep her commitments to constituents. Last year, Werner was unafraid to stand with Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne when he addressed educational curriculum that may have been in violation of state law. Her appearance led to accusations against her from the president of the Scottsdale Unified School District Governing Board, Julie Cieniawski, claiming that Werner and another member of the board “showcased their inability to honor policy [duties and obligations] and the principles of democracy at an ‘emergency press conference,’ held by the State Superintendent of Instruction, to further complain about the outcome of the collective board decision.”
Cieniawski shared her opinion that “their public commentary contained inaccuracies, disparaged a minority population, and asserted erroneous judgments regarding the benefits SUSD students receive from a comprehensive and multi-faceted education.”
Yet, others saw this episode differently and appreciated Werner’s stand for the children and constituents of her school district. In an op-ed for the Scottsdale Progress, a retired public-school teacher, Susan Winder, defended Werner and called Cieniawski’s earlier piece “divisive, misleading, and frankly, embarrassing for our great city.”
Winder wrote, “Here’s my beef: Cieniawski has attempted to silence her fellow board members – the ones voters elected to represent them. And, while Carney and Werner attacked the content of the curriculum, Cieniawski has stooped to a new low by making personal attacks on Carney and Werner. As an SUSD stakeholder, I do not want the minority board members to be silenced by the majority members. I am grateful that we now have board members who care about the quality of curriculum SUSD offers to our students, as well as the legality of the lessons… and that they are willing to speak up.”
The promises and subsequent actions on the governing board from Werner earned her the support of several women who appeared in a campaign ad on her behalf this summer for her run for the state legislature. In that ad, the women announce their support for Werner, in large part, because of her trustworthiness to keep her commitments to her constituents.
The women say, “I’m not political. I don’t go to rallies. I don’t usually donate to candidates. But this election isn’t about politics to me. This election is about protecting our family and our community. I know Carine Werner. She’s a mom, a school board member, and most importantly she’s a fighter. She stands up for what’s right and not what is politically easy. Politicians say one thing and do another, which is why I trust Carine Werner. She’s not a politician. She’s a mom like me. Carine will fight for our families and help make our neighborhoods safe. It’s time to change who we send to the state Senate. Vote Carine Werner for state Senate. I trust Carine to stand up for us.”
The Republican candidate isn’t done making promises she intends to keep in office. She’s made more commitments to the voters in her new district should they send her to the state Senate. On her campaign website, the first of those promises is that she will fight to “increase teacher pay and reduce wasteful spending.” The second is that she will work to “empower parents.” The third is that she will strive to “empower and fund law enforcement.” The fourth is that she will vote to “secure the border.” The fifth is that she will attempt to “address homelessness with compassion and accountability.” The sixth is that she will work to “champion low-tax, business friendly environment.” The seventh is that Werner promises to advocate for policies that “generate job growth.” And finally, she vows to support efforts to “improve cost of living.”
Legislative District 4 is one of the most competitive in the state. According to the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission, it has a 3.4% vote spread over the past nine statewide elections within its boundaries, with Republicans winning five of those contests.
Werner emerged from the Republican primary election in July and is facing off against incumbent Democrat state senator Christine Marsh for the right to represent Arizona Legislative District 4.
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
