Republican secretary of state nominee Rep. Alexander Kolodin (R-LD3) accused Democratic incumbent Adrian Fontes of trying to avoid a general election debate after Fontes proposed holding the debate on Sept. 21, which falls on Yom Kippur.
In a post on X, Kolodin wrote, “Adrian Fontes is trying to duck out of debating me.” He said Fontes had requested a change to the debate date and made himself available on Sept. 21, which Kolodin described as the “one and only date” offered. Kolodin also shared an image of an email from Gina Roberts, Voter Education Director with the Citizens Clean Elections Commission, showing September 21st at 6 PM as the only date and time.
Adrian Fontes is trying to duck out of debating me.
And he’s doing it in the most pathetic and religiously insulting way possible.
Adrian Fontes has requested a change in the debate date and made himself available on the one and only date that religious obligation would prevent… pic.twitter.com/L1L0VYcex9
Yom Kippur, which means the Day of Atonement, begins at sunset on Sunday, Sept. 20, and ends at nightfall on Monday, Sept. 21, in 2026. It’s the holiest day on the Jewish calendar and work is prohibited during its observance. Kolodin said he observes the holiday and would be unable to debate that day because of his religious obligations.
He wrote:
“Adrian Fontes has requested a change in the debate date and made himself available on the one and only date that religious obligation would prevent me from debating him.
“September 21st is Yom Kippur, a religious holiday that is adhered to by Jewish residents of the State of Arizona, including myself. Jews are forbidden from performing work of any kind on that day. Adrian Fontes already knows this, which is why the singular date he offered up was that date.
“This is cowardly, pathetic, and un-American.”
Hey Alex, the day Phoenix freezes over is the day I refuse to debate you. Stop lying to Arizonans.
We’re working to lock in a date that works for the production team and gives voters a chance to tune in.
I already beat you at the Farm Bureau. Can’t wait to do it again on TV.
Fontes responded on X later Tuesday, rejecting Kolodin’s accusation that he planned to avoid the debate.
“Stop lying to Arizonans. We’re working to lock in a date that works for the production team and gives voters a chance to tune in,” he wrote.
The Arizona Media Association’s current public schedule lists the 2026 secretary of state debate date as “TBD.” The Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission, which is producing the statewide debate series with the association, said candidate coordination would guide the final schedule and that the debates would be produced at SNEAKY BIG studios.
The published schedules leave the previously proposed date and the candidates’ private scheduling exchanges unspecified. Kolodin’s post included no correspondence from Fontes, Clean Elections, or the production team. Fontes’ response gave no proposed dates.
Kolodin said he would clear his calendar for a debate on another day. He also used the post to renew campaign allegations concerning Fontes’ handling of proof-of-citizenship requirements, voting eligibility for law-enforcement officers, county election canvasses, and voter security. His post included no supporting documents for those four allegations, and Fontes’ scheduling response did not address them.
Kolodin, a Republican state representative for Legislative District 3, defeated former Arizona Republican Party Chair Gina Swoboda in the Republican primary. Fontes, a Democrat, has served as Arizona’s secretary of state since 2023 and is seeking a second term.
The state’s election calendar sets Oct. 5 as the voter-registration deadline and Oct. 7 as the start of early voting in Arizona’s general election.
As of Tuesday afternoon, the secretary of state debate remained without a publicly announced date.
Voters will not be seeing a debate occur in the Arizona governor’s race between Gov. Katie Hobbs and Rep. Andy Biggs.
Hobbs announced formally on Tuesday that she wouldn’t be debating Biggs, though many speculated for months beforehand that would be the case regardless of who won the Republican primary.
The Democratic governor even stonewalled reporters for days after the primary before finally opening up to 12News reporters Brahm Resnik and Craig Harris on the subject.
Hobbs’ campaign manager Nicole DeMont told the outlet that the governor doesn’t find debates important.
DeMont said Hobbs’ time was better spent convincing constituents of her work through a statewide “Arizona First” tour with more than 100 open-press events and interviews.
“We respectfully decline debate invitations in this campaign because face-to-face engagement with Arizonans is more effective than a stage designed for short soundbites and political theater,” said DeMont.
DeMont’s statement confirmed what Hobbs appeared to indicate in media interviews in recent years: that she doesn’t believe debates hold much value with voters anymore.
Some have expressed concern that Hobbs engaging voters unchecked by opponents serves as a calculated echo chamber. They pointed to claims made in a recent Hobbs campaign ad, which were later characterized across the political spectrum as misleading or false.
The governor claimed in the ad to have reduced electricity bills, though utility rates have increased; cut red tape to build more affordable housing, though her administration imposed a housing moratorium that may cost taxpayers millions; and balanced the budget, though the multibillion-dollar surplus flipped into a deficit under her and it was the Republican-led legislature that convinced Hobbs to sign on after months of stalling and a legislative moratorium.
It will have been 8 years since Hobbs engaged in a debate.
In the past, the governor had fled from reporters when pressed on her willingness to debate opponents, and once claimed to have COVID-19 when expected to appear for a debate.
Although Hobbs won’t show, Biggs does plan to appear on the stage for the Clean Elections Debate in October. Drew Sexton, Biggs’ campaign senior advisor, said Hobbs’ continued rejection of debates was less about principle and more about fear of confrontation.
Sexton also said that Hobbs’ avoidance indicated moral failings that would explain the multiple rejections by lieutenant governor picks and the years-long criminal corruption investigation. Sources told The New York Times that both Jimmy McCain, John McCain’s son, and John Giles, former Mesa mayor and Republicans for Harris leader, turned Hobbs down for the role.
“The independent and persuadable voters up for grabs in Arizona deserve to hear from statewide candidates in a traditional debate setting, one that was held in every Arizona gubernatorial race since 1954 until Katie Hobbs ran for the position in 2022,” said Sexton. “Katie Hobbs can avoid the debate stage but she won’t get to avoid voters in November.”
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The long-awaited debate for the U.S. Senate Race in Arizona took place on Wednesday between Kari Lake and Congressman Ruben Gallego. And even the most mainstream of outlets took note, or took pains not to note, that Lake outperformed Gallego.
The Associated Press seemed to call out Rep. Gallego’s performance against Lake in a singular headline that read, “Lake’s Comfort And Polish In Front Of The Camera Stood In Contrast To Gallego.”
From @AP — “Lake’s Comfort And Polish In Front Of The Camera Stood In Contrast To Gallego” pic.twitter.com/t6bm2bnaNg
Jonathan Cooper and Gabriel Sandoval wrote for the wire, “Republican Senate candidate Kari Lake repeatedly reminded viewers Wednesday of her three-decade career on Arizona television, looking to harness the intimate connection she built with voters and overcome Democrat Ruben Gallego’s portrayal of her as a liar in the only debate of the closely watched race.”
“Lake’s comfort and polish in front of the camera stood in contrast to Gallego, a military veteran who occasionally tripped on his words. The hourlong forum, at times caustic and personal, highlighted big differences on immigration, border security, abortion and taxes.”
Detracting from her performance, the outlet noted that Lake didn’t pursue what was potentially the best attack avenue against Gallego far enough. It’s an angle President Trump has levied against Vice President Kamala Harris with great success: citing the Democrats’ current offices and asking why the changes they champion haven’t been made already.
I don't know who's running this country right now, but I've been told that he's a Democrat.
Ruben & the Democrats are in control.
Gallego is talking such a big game about what he wants to do, but his first day in Washington DC was ten years ago.
The AP observed that Gallego focused on election integrity and Lake’s objection to the 2022 gubernatorial race results, bait that Lake refused to take. However, she did pivot to a strong argument on election integrity that Gallego was poorly equipped to answer.
“You know we’ve had problems across the country since 2000. One year the Democrats are mad, the next year the Republicans are,” Lake began. “We’ve got problems with our elections, and there’s no doubt about it. The people of Arizona have been burned. They’re tired of hearing about hiccups and loopholes and problems that happen on Election Day. We just want to make sure that our legal vote counts!”
She then zeroed in on Gallego: “My opponent wants illegal votes to count! He actually voted twice to have illegals vote. He voted against the SAVE Act, which would prevent illegals from voting. I want every legal vote to count. I don’t care if you are the most liberal Democrat or the most conservative Republican or where most of Arizona is: somewhere in between. I want every legal vote to count.”
Lake offered a solution to the matter of election integrity that will likely resonate with beleaguered Arizona voters fed-up with election-day mishaps for over a decade. “My solution would be: let’s get back to something closer to what we used to have: Election day, paper ballots, and we know the results right there on the night of the election. But we definitely can’t have people pouring across our country illegally voting. Not only does he want to let them vote, he wants to give them all asylum, and we’ve got to stop this nonsense at the border and restore our country.”
Even AZCentral, an outlet that has often proven openly hostile to Lake, seemed to de facto concede that Lake, in her confrontational, ‘take-no-prisoners’ debate style, successfully steamrolled Gallego. Bill Goodykoontz wrote in an editorial, “She followed the debate tactics (of) Donald Trump (her ‘good friend,’ she said) and repeatedly went over her time limit and talked over Gallego, often resorting to personal attacks. It was ugly. And she got away with it.”
Goodykoontz observed that though Gallego didn’t take the bait, he “didn’t respond as forcefully as he might have.” Further, Lake from the start, sought to classify Gallego as the “extreme makeover” candidate by drawing stark contrasts between his current talking points and his congression record, in lockstep with the Biden-Harris administration.
“Ruben Gallego has supported — every step of the way — Kamala Harris, the border czar, and Joe Biden’s open border,” she said.
While the New York Times’ Kellen Browning assessed that the debate may not have been a “knock out blow” to Gallego, the momentum generated by a dominant debate performance could move Lake back into striking distance of her opponent.
Kari Lake can still win in Arizona. This race is not over.
She scored big point last night in her debate vs. Ruben Gallego.
In polling per FiveThirtyEight, Gallego achieved several breakaways, carrying him into double digits over Lake, the most recent at the end of September. But in the past week, he has begun to hemorrhage his lead again from thirteen points in September, back down to seven. Should the cycle the two candidates have been locked in for months repeat, it will find Lake likely within margin of error by election day, if not overtaking the Democrat.
An Arizona Republican legislator continues to hold a government agency accountable to the law.
Last week, State Senator Jake Hoffman sent a letter to the Arizona Clean Elections Commission, which was his second letter to this agency, over a new rule it had adopted “requiring candidates to receive at least 1% of total ballots cast in all primaries for their office to qualify for general election debates.” Hoffman’s latest letter called on the Commission “to submit the rule through the standard rule-making process and to invite all qualified candidates to general election debates until any new rules are appropriately adopted in a transparent and lawful manner.”
🚨 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Senate Government Committee Calls on Clean Elections Commission to Comply with State Law on Rule Change for General Election Debates
In a statement, Hoffman said, “Arizona law only gives the Commission discretion to determine the manner in which debates are conducted. It does not give the Commission unfettered discretion to pick and choose which candidates get to participate. If the Commission believes this rule is a good idea, then there should be nothing to fear from holding an open and public process for promulgating rules. Evading this process invites litigation, calls into question the independence of the Commission, and deprives Arizona citizens of the protections afforded under the APA.”
The issue that prompted the initial inquiry by Hoffman was the confirmation from the Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission that Eduardo Quintana, the Green Party candidate for U.S. Senate, would not be allowed in the upcoming October debate with Republican Kari Lake and Democrat Ruben Gallego. Quintana received 282 votes in the primary – far less than the one percent threshold established by the Commission.
Hoffman has contended that due to the Commission’s rule not being “submitted for approval to the Governor’s Regulatory Review Council for compliance with the Arizona Administrative Procedures Act, [the] maneuver violates the 2018 voter-approved Proposition 306.”
Thomas Collins, the Executive Director of the Commission, sent a letter in response to Hoffman’s first inquiry. He said, in part, that the report of the new rule “mischaracterizes a discretionary decision by the Commission, based on input from its contracted debate production and broadcast consultants, to not include the candidates who had received less than 1% of votes cast in their primaries in the 2024 Commission-sponsored debates.” Collins added, “It is both factually inaccurate and inconsistent with the APA requirements to characterize this decision as adoption of a new ‘rule’ for purposes of the APA.”
Collins’ letter prompted this most recent letter from Hoffman, who argued against the Commission’s justification for its action. Hoffman wrote, “You are sorely mistaken if you expected the serious concerns raised in my letter to be assuaged by a lengthy letter filled with fluff about why you think it’s a good idea to remove candidates from state-recognized parties from public debates. While these policy arguments may be convincing to you, it is really beside the point. I shouldn’t need to remind you that the Commission, as part of the executive branch, implements legislative policy – it does not set it.”
Hoffman concluded his communication to the agency, stating, “Because Arizona requires the Commission to ‘sponsor debates among candidates’ and the Green party candidate certainly meets Arizona’s liberal definition of ‘candidate,’ the only conceivable way the Commission could exclude a Green Party candidate from participating would be through a duly passed rule that complies with Arizona’s APA. This, however, the Commission has not done.”
After Hoffman’s newest letter to the Commission, the Arizona Green Party posted the following to its X account: “By barring the Green Party candidates for statewide & federal offices in Arizona from the televised debates over an arbitrary rule, we believe that the Arizona Clean Elections Commission has violated A.R.S. 16-192, which prohibits the use of public resources to influence the outcome of an election. The commission has used taxpayer dollars to present a false, binary choice between Democrats and Republicans in the races for Senate, Congress, and AZ Corp. Commission. This action deprives AZ voters of the knowledge that they have other options, which WILL influence the outcome.”
By barring the #GreenParty candidates for statewide & federal offices in #Arizona from the televised debates over an arbitrary rule, we believe that the @AZCCEC has violated A.R.S. 16-192, which prohibits the use of public resources to influence the outcome of an election.
The Arizona Green Party also stated, “The Arizona Clean Elections Commission & the AZ Media Association, a private entity interested in profit rather than providing the people of Arizona with all perspectives from all parties, are favoring the duopoly candidates in these races over the grassroots & non-corporate Green Party candidates. Following the lead of candidates such as Quintana for Senate, the AZGP is currently in the process of filing official election complaints on these grounds.”
The @AZCCEC & the AZ Media Association, a private entity interested in profit rather than providing the people of #Arizona with all perspectives from all parties, are favoring the duopoly candidates in these races over the grassroots & non-corporate #GreenParty candidates.
It seems that Arizonans are keenly aware of their position as a major swing state for the upcoming election just one month away.
Arizonans ranked the third-highest in Google searches for voter registration following the vice presidential debate on Tuesday between Democratic running mate Governor Tim Walz and Republican running mate Senator JD Vance.
The discovery of these search ratings was made by Final Round AI, which analyzed Google Trends data for the impact the Walz-Vance debate had throughout the country.
The company’s CEO, Michael Guan, said in a press release that the vice presidential debate was less impactful on search spikes than the presidential debate last month.
“With the vice-presidential debate between Governor Walz and Senator Vance on Tuesday, we wanted to see how this affects interest in voter registration topics. We found the debate had caused the third-highest spike in searches so far, behind the spike on September 10 after the presidential debate between Vice President Harris and former President Trump. The largest spike on September 17 came in the wake of the second assassination attempt on Donald Trump,” said Guan. “We also found that Georgia looked up voter registration the most, and Atlanta was the most interested metro area in the wake of the debate.”
The data from Final Round AI doesn’t traditionally align with the company’s purpose: their company provides an AI copilot for interviewees to land their desired jobs. Guan said that they applied their technology to bring awareness to misinformation spread by AI impacting politics.
“Voters must be wary of potential misinformation in this intense period, with the advent of AI making it much easier for people to make fake news,” said Guan. “AI has advanced to such a degree that convincing audio and video recordings can be easily made. We urge voters to take care and check that their information comes from trusted, unbiased sources. If news hasn’t come through official channels yet, it is better to wait rather than risk accidentally spreading misinformation.”
As for metro locations, Tucson ranked the fourth highest and Phoenix tied for ranking the eleventh highest.
The top ten metro areas for searches concerning voter registration were, in order: Atlanta, Georgia; Austin, Texas; Fairbanks, Alaska; Tucson; Columbus, Ohio; San Antonio, Texas; Waco/Temple/Bryan, Texas/Lafayette, Indiana; Wilmington, North Carolina; and Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina.
Georgia was ranked first, and Ohio was second. After Arizona, the top ten searches occurred in Washington, D.C., North Carolina, Texas, Arkansas, Indiana, and Nebraska/Pennsylvania tied for ninth.
However, Arizona didn’t rank as a state or by metro areas in terms of searches for “who won the debate.”
In order, those top ten states were Minnesota, New Hampshire, Maine, Vermont, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Iowa.
The top ten metro areas who topped search engines for asking who won the debate were, in order: Duluth, Minnesota/Superior, Wisconsin; Alpena Michigan; Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota; Bend, Oregon; Wausau-Rhinelander, Wisconsin; Rochester, Minnesota/Mason City, Iowa/Austin, Minnesota; Juneau, Alaska; Mankato, Minnesota; La Crosse/Eau Claire Wisconsin; and Ottumwa, Iowa/Kirksville, Missouri.
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