Key Points:

• Arizona legislators prepare for the 2026 session with 32 prefiled measures

• Lawmakers introduced 1,724 bills last year, second most in state history

• Increased number of bills is leading to longer legislative sessions

With state legislators already prefiling bills for the upcoming session, Arizona is poised to have more legislation introduced this decade than at any other point in its recorded history. 

Lawmakers had prefiled 32 measures through Nov. 26, nearly two weeks after the prefiling period began on Nov. 15. Of those measures, 26 were bills and eight were memorials and resolutions, which are not required to be signed by the governor. 

So far, the 2020s have seen about 1,650 bills introduced each regular legislative session, according to session statistic data from the Arizona Legislature’s website. The website only tracks bill statistics up until 1989, or from the 39th Legislature. 

Last year, lawmakers introduced 1,724 bills, the second most in state history. Following the shortened 2020 session due to the COVID pandemic, legislators filed 1,774 bills in 2021. 

The average number of bills introduced this decade outpaces the 2010s by almost 300. The previous decade saw an average of 1,372 bills annually and the 2000s saw an average of 1,373 bills introduced in regular legislative sessions. 

The legislator who has introduced the most bills so far in the early prefiling period is Rep. Nick Kupper, R-Surprise, who has already prefiled 10 bills before the session’s start. 

The second-year lawmaker told the Arizona Capitol Times that many of his bills focus on addressing modern issues for a digital world.

Kupper was the sponsor of last year’s age verification law that requires websites showing explicit adult content to verify a user’s identity before granting access. For the upcoming session, he has introduced House Bill 2010, which would require sellers of digital goods, including movies, TV shows, music and video games, to provide a disclaimer that buyers of these products are paying for a license to access what they’re buying, not owning the item like a physical CD. 

“At the end of the day, we as lawmakers, we can do almost any law we ever want to do. It’s just, do we have the gumption to do it?” Kupper said. 

For many lawmakers and lobbyists, the interim period between the end of the previous legislative session and the prefiling date is the best time to work on legislation for the next session. 

Joe DeMenna, a partner with DeMenna Public Affairs, said the fall season is critical for lobbyists like him who hope to get bills passed and signed by the governor. 

“If your issue is being heard by lawmakers in committee, and that’s the first time they’ve heard it, you’ve messed up,” DeMenna said. “There’s so much groundwork to be done.”

In addition to the new proposals, some bills are returning from previous sessions. Senate Bill 1004 from Senate Majority Leader John Kavanagh, R-Fountain Hills, is a returning measure from last session that would allow Empowerment Scholarship Account students to participate in interscholastic activities and athletics at a public school district near their home.

The 2025 version of Kavanagh’s bill was heavily opposed by Democrats and failed on the House floor with some Republicans absent on the day the House voted on the measure. 

With the increase in bills being filed in the 2020s, the length of the session has also increased. Each session in the decade has gone deep into June despite both chambers historically aiming to adjourn sine die by the 100th day of session, which typically falls near the end of April.

The last time lawmakers adjourned a regular legislative session in April was 2015. Lobbyist Barry Aarons said the increased length of the session is somewhat of a new practice in his 55 years of experience at the Legislature. 

“This year you could argue that it’ll be a shorter session because they all want to get out and campaign,” Aarons said. “I’ve seen election years where they just keep going, kind of like the Energizer Bunny, they just keep going. Why? Because they can. A lot of people just love being down there.”