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Responsible budget puts Arizona on right track
Every election, it seems, politicians give lip service to the need for fiscal responsibility and a balanced budget. But once they are in office, they lack the courage and resolve to actually achieve one. It’s always politically more convenient to spend more than we take in, hide growing debt and liabilities through clever accounting tricks, and leave the consequences for someone else to clean up[...]
A well-earned name: Nothing is simple in world of ‘dark money’ politics
Paul G. Ryan asked the Arizona Secretary of State’s Office what seemed like a simple question: Is a state nonprofit that spends money to influence elections actually a political committee?
More than 75 percent of record-setting Corp Comm spending shrouded in secrecy
Of the $4.1 million spent to help four candidates vying for two open seats on the board that regulates Arizona's utilities - more than in any previous Corporation Commission race - the source of more than $3 million of that is shrouded in secrecy. The so-called "dark money" has gone entirely to help Republicans Tom Forese and Doug Little.
Poll 1: Ducey up, Brno up bigger
The Arizona Free Enterprise Club today released its first poll since late September, and its results are largely the same, at least when it comes to the governor’s race. Ducey led DuVal 43 percent to 36 percent, with 5 percent going to Libertarian Barry Hess, 2 percent going to Americans Elect nominee John Lewis Mealer and 14 percent undecided.
DuVal struggles as outside groups open their pocketbooks for Ducey
As early ballots went out, the extremely lopsided outside spending in the governor’s race strongly favored Republican nominee Doug Ducey. In the meantime, independent expenditure spending for Democratic nominee Fred DuVal is picking up, but not by much.
Republicans prepare for early ballots with huge ad buy attacking DuVal
The Republican Governors Association launched what is likely the largest single-week advertising blitz of the election cycle in Arizona, attacking Democratic gubernatorial nominee Fred DuVal as a “slick lobbyist” with a liberal record.
Runaway spending: ‘Dark money’ groups facing regulatory scrutiny
The amount of campaign cash that’s been spent by third party groups that don’t have to disclose their donors and have no spending limits — so called “dark money” — has reached an all-time high in 2014.
Skepticism abounds over governor’s race polling
The dearth of reliable, independent polling in Arizona elections is nothing new. A long-term decline in independent polling by universities and media organizations has left IEs and other biased groups as the main source of publicly available polling for the state’s elections.
Free Enterprise Club targets Smith in new TV ad
The Arizona Free Enterprise Club had spent roughly $1.5 million to influence voters in several statewide and legislative Republican primary races, but had stayed out of the hotly contested governor’s race – until now.
Past the point of no return?
Since the Arizona Free Enterprise Club began its unprecedented spending in the secretary of state and Corp Comm races about six weeks ago, some observers have quietly speculated that the barrage of independent expenditures may herald the end of the group’s activities.
Cheap but effective: Attack mailers once again are in season
For a dose of fear and loathing on the campaign trail, check your mailbox.
As early ballots started arriving by mail this week for the primary election, voters’ mailboxes are also filling up with another kind of election material — political attack ads.
AZ Corp Comm candidates claim ‘dark-money’ libel, threaten lawsuit
Lucy Mason and Vernon Parker, Republicans hoping to fill two vacant seats on the state’s energy and water regulating commission, say they have been libeled by a local anti-taxation group that sent a secretly funded campaign mailer slamming them and lauding two other Republican candidates.
