In what has the makings of a highly competitive primary election, three of the four Republican candidates for the two District 7 House seats have held one of the seats for a time since the 2004 election.
Two years ago, voters elected incumbent Ray Barnes and David Burnell Smith. However, Mr. Smith was removed from office earlier this year because he violated the Clean Elections campaign finance laws in 2004. Nancy Barto was appointed to finish out his term and is campaigning for election to a full term. The trio is joined on the Sept. 12 primary election ballot by Howard Sprague.
Further complicating the political landscape is Mr. Barnes’ health. The two-term lawmaker suffered a heart attack on the House floor in June and is still recovering from quadruple-bypass surgery.
Ray Barnes
Campaigning has been difficult for the incumbent after the heart attack and resulting open-heart surgery, and Mr. Barnes freely admits he has had to push himself to do the necessary work. But that doesn’t mean he sees the near-death experience — he was revived twice by CPR before paramedics arrived on the scene — as a negative.
“There’s no doubt that I’m supposed to go back [to the House] because God put me in a position that, if he didn’t want me to go back, he could have stopped me,” he says. “I’m more confident than ever, right now.”
The biggest challenge so far has been letting voters know he is running again and will be able to return to the Capitol in January. An upside, though, is that almost everyone in the district knows what happened to him, which he hopes translates into votes.
“They may not even know my name, but they know my story. They go, ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know!’” Mr. Barnes says. “It’s a story that I couldn’t have paid $25,000 for and gotten better publicity.”
As he has campaigned, Mr. Barnes says more than 80 percent of the people want the state to do something to stop illegal immigration.
“People in this district want the border closed and want the people who cross it to be prosecuted,” he says.
That issue will be the one voters think about when they go to the polls, Mr. Barnes says, and it may be the downfall of Ms. Barto, who, in April, voted against a bill [S1157] that would have allowed the state to prosecute illegal immigrants as felony trespassers.
He also says voters are acutely aware of Mr. Smith’s legal problems and he had many people ask him if his campaign had anything to do with his former seatmate’s.
“Too many people did that unsolicited for me to think he doesn’t have some problems,” Mr. Barnes said.
Nancy Barto
It’s not often that sitting lawmakers have to tell voters that, yes, I am your representative even though you didn’t vote for me, but that’s exactly the challenge Ms. Barto has faced in her campaign this year.
She became a member of the House of Representatives in February, after the Supreme Court ruled Mr. Smith had to be removed from office for his campaign finance discretions.
Despite having to overcome a lack of recognition — “People aren’t familiar with my name, as a general rule,” she says — Ms. Barto says she has been well received by voters.
She says the time she has served so far in the Legislature has taught her that more information results in better policy for the state.
“I’ve learned that there is a lot to learn from listening to [interested] parties,” she said. “Legislation generally improves when you listen to more people on an issue.”
Ms. Barto says her goal is to use that lesson to help meet the district’s needs on immigration, taxes and education issues.
She stands apart from her three opponents in her stance on immigration. While the others are critical of the proposed guest worker programs and support harsh penalties for illegal immigrants, Ms. Barto is more restrained.
Instead of battling the federal government, she told the crowd at an Aug. 2 Clean Elections debate, Arizona needs to work with federal agencies to solve the problem and ensure the economy does not take a hit.
“Of course, when you say that, some will think you’re soft on the issue,” she said at the debate. “But that’s the truth — people are screaming for workers.”
David Burnell Smith
The campaign signs around District 7 implore voters to “re-elect” Mr. Smith. And, while he’s not the current officeholder, there’s no doubt he feels the seat is rightfully his and he will regain it in the fall.
“In my mind, I am [still the representative], because I’m running for re-election,” he says. “What was done to me was done illegally. I believe I’m still the representative.”
Most voters, Mr. Smith said, don’t bring up the situation at all. Those who do, though, are almost all supportive, and he says they want him back in office to help solve the illegal immigration problem.
“Most of the people agree with me that, once you’ve entered this country illegally, it’s a felony and you should be punished,” he says. “If you have a leak in your house, you shut off the water — you don’t let it run.”
Mr. Smith says that when — not if — he is re-elected, he will sponsor legislation that will require the federal government to repay the state for education, health care and prison costs associated with illegal immigrants.
He also wants to work to make the state’s public education system better and says he will ask the speaker to create a task force and send him to Vermont and Connecticut — two states lauded for their education systems — on a fact-finding mission to learn what they do differently than Arizona.
“I think it’s time we try to find out…why we’re losing ground,” Mr. Smith said.
After his troubles with Clean Elections the past two years, he is running a traditionally financed campaign. He says he has raised about $18,000, enough to get him through the primary. He points out, though, that he is not campaigning against his opponents as much as he is running on his record.
“I’m not running against anyone — I’m running for David Smith,” he says. “I’m running to win — best of luck to them who come in second.”
Howard Sprague
He’s the only candidate of the four who is running a publicly financed campaign, but, he hasn’t yet met the minimum requirements to qualify for that funding. Mr. Sprague’s betting that the Clean Elections money, which he expects to be eligible for later this month, won’t be nearly as much help as the endorsement he has received from Mr. Barnes.
“I would say that’s one of the biggest plus-factors in my campaign — especially since it’s Ray Barnes,” he said.
Though not running for office as a team, the pair are coordinating their campaigns. Mr. Sprague doesn’t yet have much in the way of money, but he says he is getting by with targeted phone calls. When he gets the money, he says he’ll have plenty of time to put up signs and mail out fliers.
“Early literature usually ends up in the trash — that’s what people tell me,” he says.
By his count, most residents are concerned with immigration and taxes. While he acknowledges that he, Mr. Barnes and Mr. Smith all have similar views on those issues, Mr. Sprague says Ms. Barto may feel the repercussions of her stance on illegal immigration at the polls.
He also thinks Mr. Smith has garnered so much negative press the past two years that voters are reluctant, if not outright unwilling, to vote for him.
“I think it’s kind of hard for him to overcome that,” Mr. Sprague said. “If he’s not going to overcome that, then I think a conservative needs to replace him.”