Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas was elected to a second term on Nov. 4, easily defeating Democratic challenger Tim Nelson.
Of nearly 1 million votes cast for county attorney, Thomas received some 515,000 votes compared to more than 440,000 for Nelson, a former chief legal counsel for Gov. Janet Napolitano.
Nelson emerged from the Democratic primary after defeating Phoenix Police Department administrator Gerald Richard, immediately ushering in a blistering battle between Nelson and Thomas.
No topics were left off the table as squabbles over the effectiveness and intent of Thomas’ policies for prosecutions, handling of illegal immigrants, frequent seeking of capital punishment and the use of hired outside counsel.
Both campaigns took exception to each others’ acceptance of campaign contributions, with Thomas accusing Nelson of falling into the debt of high-profile defense attorneys and Nelson faulting his opponent’s connection with private law firms contracted by the office to handle county cases.
Complaints over political spending by outside interests also were filed by each campaign or their supporters.
The Arizona Democratic Party urged the Secretary of State Jan Brewer to investigate the state Republican Party’s funding sources for television ads raising suspicions about Nelson’s connections to attorneys who represent pornographers and child molesters.
And in turn, Barnett Lotstein, a Thomas spokesman and campaign volunteer, called for the Maricopa County Elections Department to inquire about an alleged improper coordination of Nelson’s campaign with a state Democrat-funded group.
The independent expenditure group ran radio ads holding Thomas responsible for the high-profile arrests of executives from the Phoenix New Times. It’s a charge Thomas denies, but his campaign hinted at the possibility of taking legal action against stations running the ads that compared Thomas’ use of his office to “Castro’s Cuba.”
Throughout the campaign, Nelson and Thomas traded heated exchanges, with Nelson accusing his opponent of wasting public resources for self-promotion, and Thomas digging into Nelson’s legal background to unearth his work on behalf of the American Civil Liberties Union and convicted double-murderer Jose Ceja.
Jason Rose, a hired political consultant and campaign manager for Thomas, attributed the county attorney’s re-election to public appreciation of Thomas’ no-mercy approach to criminals and illegal immigration.
Thomas has reduced crime in the Valley, and voters rejected a candidate that would take a softer approach, Rose said, adding that Thomas was able to win despite a caustic political environment for Republicans.
“Tim Nelson ran a very good, energetic campaign and he should be applauded,” Rose said. “He had the support of every major news organization, the governor, the attorney general and everybody in between — and he still got clocked by Andy Thomas.”
Nelson said the election’s results were disappointing. He attributed the loss to both internal and external forces, noting the county’s voter-registration statistics favor Republicans.
He said he believed the 12-percent registration advantage for Republicans in Maricopa County was a gap he could close by Nov. 4, but his campaign managed to shave only five points off the figure.
“I hoped we would be able to overcome the registration advantage because I thought we had a compelling message,” Nelson said. “Obviously we didn’t.”
According to the most recent figures released by the Arizona Secretary of State’s Office, 692,000 residents were registered Republicans, compared to 544,000 Democrats.
The county also has 483,000 registered independents who are not affiliated with the Republican, Democrat, Libertarian or the Green parties.
But the contest did not fall cleanly on party lines, as noted by Republican Rick Romley, Thomas’ predecessor, who endorsed Nelson and accused Thomas of whipping up anti-illegal immigration hysteria to the point of “McCarthyism.”
Former Republican Attorney General Grant Woods also sided with Nelson. He said the reason he went against the party was rooted in Thomas’ frequent criticism of Maricopa County Superior Court judges and his use of the “plead-to-the-lead” policy that critics claim hamstrings deputy prosecutors by requiring them to seek the maximum penalty in violent crimes.
Libertarian Michael Kielsky, who campaigned largely on a platform opposing the prosecution of “victimless” crimes such as drug possession and prostitution, received more than 4 percent of votes cast for a total of 42,768.
Thomas held a 7-point lead over Nelson in recent polling conducted by Arizona State University, but the survey also found more than 20 percent of participants remained undecided.