KJZZ’s Friday NewsCap revisits some of the biggest stories of the week from Arizona and beyond.
To talk about a restart in “fake electors” case, the Department of Justice saying it will appeal a ruling on getting Arizona’s voter rolls and more, The Show sat down with Marcus Dell’Artino of First Strategic and Matt Grodsky of Matter of State Strategies.
Transcript
MARK BRODIE: Hi, I’m Mark Brodie, and this is the Friday NewsCap podcast. Each week, we review the biggest stories week with experts, reporters and commentators to put the news in perspective.
Here’s this week’s episode:
MARK KELLY: They created this crooked fund to reward criminals who assaulted cops. I’m the son of two police officers. I find this a disgrace.
JEFF WENINGER: This addresses advertising to children in a lot of the same ways that alcohol and tobacco, and not allowing the actual devices to have cartoon characters or be a game or something like that.
ANTHONY KERN: She should be tired of spending taxpayer money on frivolous, lawfare-type court action.
MATT GRESS: I want to thank them for coming in and blocking this bill, even though we watered it down so much that it’s doing one key thing related to protecting perfectly good historic homes.
KRIS MAYES: Insurers would point to MultiPlan. MultiPlan would point to insurers. And in a coordinated effort, they would pressure providers — doctors, nurses, and hospitals — into accepting that low offer.
WARREN PETERSEN: It’s just that last 1% is often the hardest because it’s the areas where you haven’t been able to reach consensus yet.
MARK BRODIE: And joining me to talk about a restart in the case of the so-called “fake electors,” the feds saying they’ll appeal a ruling on getting Arizona’s voter rolls and more, are Marcus Dell’Artino of First Strategic. Marcus, good morning.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: Good morning.
MARK BRODIE: And Matt Grodsky of Matter of State Strategies. Matt, good morning to you.
MATT GRODSKY: Morning.
MARK BRODIE: So Matt, let me start with you with Attorney General Kris Mayes says she is going to take the “fake electors” case, so-called “fake electors” case, back to the grand jury. The state Supreme Court declined to hear a review of lower court rulings, which said that the case could not move forward because the grand jury did not get a certain information.
Is there any part of you that’s surprised that she’s continuing on with this case?
MATT GRODSKY: Not at all. I mean, I think it’s important to set the right precedent here.This is about protecting the next election as much as it is about making sure that there’s justice for the past one. If we set a precedent where you can essentially just be a fake elector and there’s no consequences, that’s incredibly dangerous for this republic.
So I commend her for doing that, and I think that Arizonans by and large understand that what happened with the fake electors was wrong and that wasn’t OK to do. So, I think it’s right that she’s pursuing it, um, and we’ll see. We’ll see if there’s a different outcome with a potentially different judge and different evidence that’s presented.
MARK BRODIE: Well, I mean, Marcus, there also might be a different attorney general by the time this case gets anywhere, given that, you know, just in terms of logistics, in terms of how quickly the courts move. There is, of course, an election coming up in November —
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: What?
MARK BRODIE: You might have heard about this.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: That’s crazy.
MATT GRODSKY: That’s nuts.
MARK BRODIE: I know. We’ll get to that. Obviously if Mayes wins reelection, presumably she would continue this, but if not, the Republicans who would take over, both of them have said this is over.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: Yeah, that’s no surprise, I don’t think. And to your point, there’s going to be a lot of time. The wheels of justice turn slowly, I think somebody once said. And so I don’t think there’ll be any surprises there.
There’s so much time that’s gone by between the first case and now today that I think a lot of people sort of assumed that this had gone away and it was a done deal, and so I was a little surprised to be honest with you. I think I was probably one of those that said the show was over.
MARK BRODIE: Thought maybe she would just drop it and say, "OK, I tried. Let’s move on."
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: I also think that Democrats obviously see an opportunity. I think that they are looking at Trump’s numbers and feeling a little full and decided to go for the gusto.
MARK BRODIE: Matt, do you think — obviously we don’t want to suggest anybody is thinking anything that maybe they’re not thinking — but is there a political implication to this? Like does this, especially since it will most likely still be going or starting when the election is happening, does this become an issue?
MATT GRODSKY: Yeah, I think the political thing to consider is as we get closer to this election you speak of in November, I think the administration is going to likely pull more shenanigans and try to do what they can to influence the outcome, either before or after. I mean, he’s signaled as much.
So I think the fake electors case probably becomes more of a reminder or a subject that comes up in those conversations as we get closer. So I think it’s politically advantageous from that perspective.
MARK BRODIE: So, Marcus, speaking of this election that apparently we all just found out about that’s coming up in November, the U.S. Justice Department has said that it is going to appeal a ruling from a federal judge here in Arizona that said the Justice Department is not entitled to Arizona’s voter rolls. This is something that Adrian Fontes had fought.
Fontes, Matt we should point out that you have worked and, and continue to work for him.
MATT GRODSKY: Yep.
MARK BRODIE: The judge in this case was pretty clear that she didn’t think DOJ had much of a leg to stand on.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: Just to point out, Matt works for him in a campaign capacity, not in the official Secretary of State’s. He’s not a government employee. But I don’t think there should be any surprises here. I certainly wasn’t surprised. I mean, this is sort of classic DOJ, classic federal government is appeal, appeal, appeal as long as you can till you get the ruling that you want.
And so I certainly wasn’t shocked. I was a little surprised that the U.S. Postal Service is starting to make rules based on a decision that hasn’t been finalized. And so all of this just adds a lot of chaos to the vote-by-mail system. And I recognize I am in the minority on this issue, but I love vote by mail. I love it.
MARK BRODIE: I don’t think that’s in the minority.
MATT GRODSKY: Yeah, I think you’ve got a lot of fans with you on that.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: For a Republican. Just to point out, I’m the Republican.
And I will tell you it has been worked to the advantage of Republicans for ever since it was invented, largely because of the Forbes campaign, if you remember that guy who ran for president.
MARK BRODIE: Steve Forbes, yeah.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: And so it’s been a tool that Republicans have done very well with. And so I understand the push. But look, even Turning Point has said, like if you look at that latest SRP election, it was all about getting these ballots back.
So, I think even Turning Point in Arizona has realized, “Look, we have to be better on how we use the system.” I just don’t think nationally that message has set in. And I have a tendency to spend a little bit of time in some assisted living centers with some older folks, and I’m going to tell you that that is probably a 95% Republican base. And if those folks aren’t voting, I am a tad bit curious about — I think it will have a net poor effect on the Republican turnout.
MARK BRODIE: Hmm. So, Matt, with the caveat that none of the three of us are lawyers in this room, given what Judge Susan Brnovich wrote in her initial ruling against the DOJ, any reason to think that DOJ will be more successful with another judge?
MATT GRODSKY: No, and I think that’s why the secretary said this was a futile effort. Look, that is a Trump-appointed judge that, this was not a legal term, but she essentially laughed away the DOJ’s position on this, right? So sure, to Marcus’s point, they can keep appealing it. The secretary’s going to keep fighting.
And I’ll just add, look, Republicans are the ones that in the ’90s essentially invented vote by mail. It’s been to their collective benefit for years. North of 80% of Arizonans enjoy that, and we saw the ramifications of people not voting by mail in the 2022 election when Trump told a bunch of people to stay home, and that didn’t work out so well for his party. So they can take that stance, but, I don’t think it’s going to work out super well for them.
MARK BRODIE: OK, so Marcus, you mentioned the USPS rules. They submitted or released sort of initial rules in response to an executive order that the president had issued a little while back. And … one of the big provisions is that states would have to — and I’m going to paraphrase here — states would have to basically submit to the federal government a list of everybody who will be getting a mail ballot.
There are rules about the barcodes that have to be on the envelopes, both the ones that go to the voters and the ones that voters return. And perhaps understandably, or predictably, a lot of county election officials are saying, “Wait a minute, I’m not sure we can actually pull this off before the November election.”
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: Yeah, I am absolutely confident they can’t. And I say that, of course, being conservative and seeing how government sort of the wheels work, and wheels do not work quickly or efficiently, I will just tell you that.
And so you’re adding another layer of bureaucracy on your vote-by-mail system, right? Look, the cleanest way to do it would have the county recorders send that information if that’s what you wanted to do. I don’t believe that that makes the system any more efficient, I will tell you that, but that would be the best course of action.
Putting the U.S. Postal Service in the middle of this, for God’s sake, who’s broke and been broke for I don’t even know how long is a terrible idea.
MARK BRODIE: I mean, Matt, does this potentially impact — especially in a place like Arizona, where the vast majority of voters vote early and a lot of them vote by mail. Some put their ballots in a drop box or bring it to an election office, but a lot of folks use the mail. What kind of impact might this have on turnout and who turns out?
MATT GRODSKY: Oh, I think it would decimate turnout, and Marcus brought up the point of elderly folks, stuff like that. I think it would be catastrophic electorally. And it’s not popular, which is why it just astounds me that they continue to push and push and push on this particular issue.
So I don’t think it’s going anywhere. I don’t think that you can actually execute something like this given the timeline we have.
And then at the end of the day, I think if we still believe in the Constitution, the Constitution is very clear that it’s up to the states to run their elections, right? It’s not up to the federal government. And I think there’s a lot of Arizonans that still appreciate that and don’t want their federal government meddling in this system.
MARK BRODIE: And, Marcus, we should mention there are some lawsuits challenging this. We’ll get the rulings on those shortly, but go ahead.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: Quickly, I was just going to say this as sort of a side note, but if you go back and look at the SRP election, there was numerous complaints about one, how fast people got their ballots through the USPS system and how long it took that ballot to get back once they put it in the mailbox.
And that election is a microcosm of a statewide election. I mean, those ballots are absolutely nothing compared to what is going through the mail system when we hit October. So I’d really like a lot more work done on the front end before we throw this, uh, idea into practice.
MARK BRODIE: Marcus, do you agree with Matt that if these rules were to go into effect as released, it would really lower turnout?
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: I do. Yeah. Most people — and look, we’re election geeks and we do this all the time. We’re all set up to vote however humanly possible. We’re going to get our ballots in. Joe Arizona is not going to — who’s working his butt off to cover his gas bill and his butcher bill — this is not the first thing on his mind.
And I probably spend, I don’t know, 90% of my time once we get into October taking phone calls from what I affectionately call my civilian friends, walking them through how to vote, whether it’s finding a polling place for them, whether it’s finding out if they were actually registered to vote — which is always my favorite — or how to get their mail-in ballot. So I think we overestimate the details that most citizens understand about the voting process.
MATT GRODSKY: Agreed.
MARK BRODIE: Interesting. All right.
Marcus, some more drama between the Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap and the Board of Supervisors. The recorder is asking a judge to hold the supervisors in contempt and fine them $100,000 per day. He says they are not complying with a recent court ruling.
We’ll mention that you have represented the Board of Supervisors, so you have some affiliation there. Again, we’re not lawyers, but what is actually going on here?
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: Well, a lot of personality, a lot of drama, a lot of fighting. And it’s all going to end up in a courtroom, unfortunately. And that means the taxpayers are picking up the bill.
And at the same time, Recorder Heap, in addition to fighting with the Board, is also fighting, I think, with the Attorney General’s Office. Matt might know more about that.
But the sad part about this is it all results in taxpayer funding being used to settle lawsuits, and I just never think that that’s the best way to go about spending taxpayer dollars.
MARK BRODIE: Well so, Matt, this is, as I mentioned, based on Recorder Heap’s assertion that the supervisors are not doing what a court said they had to do in terms of giving him some of the election duties back and some IT staff, things like that. I mean, it seems like Marcus is probably right that this is just more time for the lawyers in the court.
MATT GRODSKY: Oh, he’s absolutely right. And look, the board, my understanding is they’re appealing that previous ruling. I think it feels very much like a stunt to try to hold them in contempt at taxpayer expense.
Look, I’ve said this over and over again: Elections have consequences, right? It was very clear the type of recorder that Heap was going to be in 2024. He won. I think he’s operated the way we expected, which is relatively incompetent from my perspective.
So I’m assuming we’ll continue to see fights like this running up the bill, and it’s just unfortunate because this is not how it should operate. And I think most people understand that the board is trying to keep an erratic actor in check. So we’ll see what happens.
MARK BRODIE: Go ahead, Marcus.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: I’d just clarify, like here’s what’s going on is that the duties of elections is sort of bifurcated right now between the Board and the recorder on Election Day and vote by mail — voting—
MARK BRODIE: Or early voting, yeah.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: And early voting. And so what Recorder Heap would like to do is sort of concentrate all the elections duties into his office. And what the Board of Supervisors would like to do is be able to retain the responsibilities that they’ve had the last couple cycles at least in how they operate. And so that is at the heart of the argument.
MARK BRODIE: I mean, we have a primary coming up in a little more than a month, and some of these issues are still not adjudicated yet. Like what does that do?
MATT GRODSKY: Oh, I mean, everyone’s going to have to follow the law, right? But I think going back to the previous point, it’s ultimately a checks and balances issue, right? And I think most Arizonans and people in Maricopa County respect the notion of checks and balances.
So, we’ll see what happens in the primary.Hopefully everybody gets along, but unfortunately the tab’s going to keep running.
MARK BRODIE: Is there going to be a big scramble in the weeks leading up to ballots going out and election day for the primary, given that we still don’t necessarily know who’s doing what?
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: Ordinarily I’d say I don’t think so, but I would say I hope not. I hope that we run a smooth and efficient and fair system like we always have. And if there is chaos, Katie, bar the door.
I mean, the electorate, we are underestimating how much anxiety is out there in the electorate. I heard this phrase not all that long ago: There’s a match that’s close to the timber —
MARK BRODIE: Tinderbox.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: Tinderbox. And I think that’s a little bit of where we are right now.
MARK BRODIE: Interesting. All right, Marcus, let me stick with you. One of the things that the Legislature has to do — the one thing that they are constitutionally obligated to do — is approve a budget, and the fiscal year will be ending at the end of this month. We going to have one?
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: We’re getting there. Rumor has it as of — well, I don’t think I’ll get in trouble for saying this — but I think we’re going next week. So Tuesday, I think you’ll see an appropriations agenda come out. Here’s your true-tale sign if you really want to know, is Mr. Livingston coming back from—
MARK BRODIE: (Rep.) David Livingston (R-Peoria), the appropriations chair.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: He goes away for the summertime and has said, I’ll come back for the budget.” My understanding is he’s coming back, which would be a pretty good sign we’re ready to go.
Now does that mean there’s a deal, a 100% deal? I don’t know that. I know last, at last check, we were 95% of there. What’s happened is we’ve obviously got a revenue gap that we had about, let’s just say $400 million we had to go find.
There were a hundred sort of ideas that were floated. At the end of the day, what’s happened is the Joint Legislative Budget Committee, who’s sort of the budget guys for the Legislature, has said, “Hey, her revenue projections look a little bit rosier than we thought.”
MARK BRODIE: Hmm.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: And so that’s going to be used to sort of close this gap.
MARK BRODIE: Matt, we heard from Senate President Warren Petersen at the top of the NewsCap saying the last 1% is often the hardest because you work through all the stuff that you can work through and then you leave the stickiest stuff till the end. Do you get the sense that we’re close to resolving some of that last 1 or 2%?
MATT GRODSKY: Yeah, I think if you cut through the noise, I think we’re close. He said 95, I heard 97 — we’re in the 90s, right? And I think you’re right that those last few percentage points are always the toughest, but I think folks are working at it. They want to be done. They want to get back to their collective campaigns and don’t want to be sitting here in June, so I think that there’s the effort, in that regard, to move forward.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: Just a reminder: We moved up the primaries to July, so you might want to get out of session sooner rather than later. And also, if history’s any barometer here, we’ll start the budget, we’ll get the process going, we’re going to have a little blowup in the middle of it, and then that’ll get resolved and we’ll be done.
MARK BRODIE: Well, so I was going to ask: If obviously, you know, leadership is negotiating with the governor and the governor’s staff, do you feel like this is going to be the kind of year where the rank and file are like, “No”?
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: I don’t think they’re ready for no, but I think they’re ready for, “I’m not really happy.” I think neither side will get exactly what they wanted. But keep in mind, look, revenue numbers were — I know I just told you they were up, but they’re not significantly up. They were—
MARK BRODIE: They were pretty far down in April.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: Right, exactly. So, it was enough to bridge this little hole that they’ve got. But look, we’re not building new roads in Snowflake with this rosy budget. So a lot of these people, they’re not going to get exactly what they want, but that’s usually the sign of a decent budget.
MATT GRODSKY: That’s how it’s supposed to work. Neither side is supposed to be 100% happy at the end of the day. That’s the art of compromise and working together, so if that’s where we net out, I think that’s a positive.
MARK BRODIE: OK, so what do you think, Matt, what do you think Democrats will have to give up to reach this compromise?
MATT GRODSKY: Oh, it’s hard for me to speculate on what they’ll have to give up. I mean, that’s why I think it’s so important and why they’re focused on flipping the Legislature this November so that they don’t have to worry so much about what they have to give up going forward.
But I think they’re going to take their cues from the governor’s office. I think they’re driving the bus on this one, and I don’t think anyone wants to throw a wrench in that effort from the Democrats’ perspective.
MARK BRODIE: Marcus, any prediction on what the Republicans will have to give up?
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: I would say, just to throw this in, I think the Democrats probably give up any hope of any ESA reform is my guess. That’s a flat-out guess. But the Democrats do get significant reform on data center tax incentives.
MARK BRODIE: OK. How about Prop. 123?
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: Ooh.
MATT GRODSKY: I don’t think the Republicans are going to give them anything that looks like a win on 123.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: Yeah, I think … well, the governor’s office has certainly seen that as that would be a nice add-on but not a primary focus right now. We got to get this budget done.
MARK BRODIE: And once the budget’s done, obviously, they can stay in session for however long they want — they have to get the budget done by the end of the fiscal year. In previous years, we have seen traditionally they pass the budget and it’s maybe another week or so until the session adjourns. There’s still a decent amount of business that they have to do, including figuring what ballot referrals they’re going to send to the the voters this fall.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: That’s probably the biggest part. As far the mechanics of it, most of the bills that are going to go have been put in a place at the final read section. And they’re ready — the next part of business would be going to the governor’s office. I think you could take care of that in about — if you really worked — a day.
MARK BRODIE: OK.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: Maybe two. But the tough part is the ballot referrals, and I will tell you that the question right there is how long does your ballot want to be? I mean, if you want it to, you could make your ballot five pages long.
MARK BRODIE: Right.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: But I don’t think anybody really wants to go through that exercise. So I think you have room for maybe three or four more to go on there, but not much past that.
MARK BRODIE: In addition to the ones that they sent last year.
MATT GRODSKY: Yeah, and I would say it comes back to the convenience argument that we talked about before, right? You know, people doing extra work if you get rid of vote by mail, people having to do extra work and research if your ballot’s really long, so I think that’s something they’re weighing as they consider what to refer.
MARK BRODIE: All right. We’ll see what happens. Matt Grodsky, Marcus Dell’Artino, thank you both. Appreciate it.
MATT GRODSKY: Thank you, sir.
MARCUS DELL’ARTINO: Appreciate it.
