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KJZZ's Friday NewsCap: Hobbs kicks off 2026 reelection campaign with a shift to the center

Former state lawmaker Regina Cobb and Sam Richard of Consilium Consulting in KJZZ's studios.
Amber Victoria Singer/KJZZ
Former state lawmaker Regina Cobb and Sam Richard of Consilium Consulting in KJZZ's studios.

KJZZ’s Friday NewsCap revisits some of the biggest stories of the week from Arizona and beyond.

To talk about Gov. Katie Hobbs’ State of the State speech, a proposal to make Arizona elections more like Florida’s and more, The Show sat down with former state lawmaker Regina Cobb and Sam Richard of Consilium Consulting.

Conversation highlights

MARK BRODIE: Sam, let me start with you. Just general reaction to the governor’s State of the State speech. I mean, everybody stayed and faced her this time. So I guess that’s an improvement from over past years, right?

SAM RICHARD: Yeah, that’s a great starting point. Absolutely. And I was absolutely pleased. I thought that her poise, her obvious preparation and really, really great writing. Frankly, the delivery was wonderful.

Also, because of the way that this first week of the Legislature goes, I was lucky enough to see it another couple times at the local kind of regional chambers that hosted, her give the speech again. So I really, really appreciated the narrative that it cast for the remaining time in her first term and really set up the stage for what really is an in-cycle moment for for the political time we’re in.

Entering her third year in office, Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs told lawmakers to focus on cutting costs for Arizonans who have faced an increasing cost of living in a state that used to be known for its affordability.

BRODIE: Regina, what do you make of it?

REGINA COBB: I agree the speech was well written. I think that, oftentimes when they give a speech, I would like to see it come from the heart. When they read the speech, it’s difficult. And that’s the only thing I would say as far as the presentation goes. I feel like that a lot of times that you get more accomplished if you just speak from your heart.

There was a lot of things in there that have changed over the last few years, like border and her, need to now be a border czar when she wasn’t before.

What I do like about it was there was a lot of conversation about water. I feel like Gov. Hobbs hasn’t got a lot accomplished in the last few years. And if water is something that she could get accomplished in the next few years, that would be a huge accomplishment.

BRODIE: It’s interesting you mentioned about some of the topics and maybe the tone shifting a little bit, because there’s been a lot of talk — obviously, with Republicans at both the state and the national level having more control than they did, or at least on the state level having bigger majorities in the Legislature — that the governor might have to — for example, there’s a lot of talk when she said that the Laken Riley Act on the federal level she was supportive of.

Did it surprise you at all, some of the stuff that she talked about? I mean, she still talked about ESAs and how she wants to try to rein those in a little bit or shrink the program a little bit. Was this maybe as much of a Democratic speech, I guess, as she’s given in the past?

COBB: No it wasn’t. It was more of an independent speech. And I think this is coming up two years before an election cycle, and that usually happens. All of a sudden you go from very Republican to independent, very Democrat to independent. And I expected what I heard.

BRODIE: And, Sam, there’s a lot of talk about the speech maybe being sort of the kickoff of the governor’s 2026 reelection campaign.

RICHARD: I think that’s definitely a reality because that’s the moment that we’re in. But I think what I heard more is a speech for Arizonans. And I think that what we saw in this election that we just finished was really a moment to reflect and respond. And I thought that what Gov. Hobbs did with this speech was really be responsive to the moment and the message that Arizona voters provided.

Because all of our attention is on what happened just a few short 60, 75 days ago at the election. But I think folks forget that two years ago, Gov. Hobbs won to be the duly elected governor of Arizona, and she has the right to speak and cast a vision for the Arizona that she sees. And I thought the Arizona dream narrative in the speech was my favorite thread throughout the whole thing.

BRODIE: So Regina, you’ve been down — you both have been down at the Capitol this week. I’m curious what kind of vibe you’re getting in terms of whether or not this is going to be a year when people get stuff done, whether this is going to be a year when there’s a lot of squabbling, either partisan or otherwise. Is it too early to get that kind of sense, or did you have something?

COBB: Oh, I think it’s less than what it has been in the past. And one of the things that probably indicated it was that everybody was sitting forward and and listening to the speech. So I think we want to get things passed this year. You don’t want to have a ballot initiative on every issue, and trying to work with that.

And there are some big issues out there.Like I said, one that could be a bipartisan issue is water. And I think they need to get something done. And the Republicans want to go from (agriculture) to urban. Governor Hobbs wants to do rural water. I think there’s a common ground somewhere in between the two. And I think you could get both done.

BRODIE: Sam, did you get a vibe from being down there this year? Or, this week?

RICHARD: Yeah well, this week felt like a year. That’s fair. But I think that one of my takeaways is that we absolutely have a number of freshmen coming into the Capitol this year. But relatively compared to the last few election cycles, we have a smaller number number of freshmen. So I think there’s a little bit of a sense that this is not just summer camp, like where we’re seeing each other again.

Like there’s a little bit more of a gelling that the team is coming together. And yes, we know which jerseys we’re all wearing, but we also know each other’s kids’ names. And we get to see how everyone’s doing. And I think that congeniality has definitely come through in this first week or so.

BRODIE: Let me ask you one last question on this, Regina, because you’ve been a state legislator, you’ve been in the chamber during State of the State speeches. How much does that really set the tone for what’s to come over the next couple of months?

COBB: What that does — and Gov. Ducey was a lot like GOv. Hobbs is — they’re they’re they’re setting their feet in cement. They’re saying, “This is where I’m where I’m going to be standing at.” You just got to be able to move one direction or another on that. And so it does kind of set the tone.

I always hated it when the governor came up with the budget first.

BRODIE: Which, the governor will release her budget later today.

COBB: She will. And I think that that's a travesty. I actually think that that sets the wrong tone. Because I think that it should come out of the House, as it does in the federal government. And so I don’t agree with that. But same thing: as soon as her budgets kind of come out, it’s going to say, “This is what I want. This is where I’m going to go to.” And there’s no secrets then. It’s all out there.

Lawmakers are not rushing to renew Proposition 123, the education funding mechanism set to expire in July.

BRODIE: Sam, let me ask you about Prop. 123, which is the measure that was passed a decade ago to get more money into schools. It was voter approved. It is going to expire this year. And there’s been a lot of talk about efforts to renew it.

My colleague Wayne Schutsky this week reported that it doesn’t seem like there’s necessarily a whole lot of hurry at the Capitol to do this, to get it on a special election ballot this spring.

RICHARD: Yeah. I think that some of that is because we have cleared the hurdle in terms of convincing the right people that this is important to do. So that box is checked. There’s less of a sense of urgency because we all know and understand the importance of getting this done.

And I think you heard in the clips right before we came on (Senate Minority Leader Priya) Sundareshan speaking about the fact that we don’t want to just shove something to the ballot without thinking through every little detail.

This was a deeply, deeply complex issue that we’re talking about, taking money from the state land trust and maybe adjusting a percentage that has to run against actuarial tables. And there’s a whole bunch of different trustees. It’s not just the K-12 system, right? We have state land, federal land that we have to work through and all.

And that isn’t even talking about yet the deeply complex education policy questions that are going to be at the table. Do we give this money to districts with no strings attached, or do we give some programmatic directions? Should it go to teachers, or should this go to support a classroom site fund or things like that? So all of those questions I know are being discussed at length right now.

I think that there was some sense of urgency that may have been — I don’t say a false sense of urgency, but there was some misunderstanding about what needed to happen procedurally to get the question to the ballot at the right time and in the right way. My understanding is that all of that has been settled.

So behind the scenes, all of those questions are being answered. And you’re going to see a grand bargain come through the Legislature referred to the ballot, and it’ll be mailed to people — for those that are on PEVL — or will be able to vote at the polls, likely sometime this fall.

BRODIE: At the same time, though, Regina, it seemed like last year there was also agreement that something had to be done. I mean, the governor had a plan. There are a couple different plans in the Republican controlled Legislature. But the proverbial devil was in the proverbial details. Is that still the case?

COBB: It’s still the case. I think that, when you talk to the Republicans, they want all of it to go to teacher pay. When you talk to Gov. Hobbs, she wants it to go to district conditional assistance so that it goes to wherever it is needed within the district. So I think that they’re going to have to come up with the policy that’s good. The amount needs to be negotiated

BRODIE: What percentage.

COBB: What percentage. Are we keeping the same percentage? Treasurer (Kimberly) Yee wants to drop it. And Gov. Hobbs wants to raise it so that there’s more money there. You’ve got to protect the corpus. But we’ve proven that we could do that at the level that it’s at right now.

I don’t know if you raise it, if you’re going to protect the corpus of the fund. So I think that’s going to be a big part of it, too.

BRODIE: Sam, do you think that with all these sort of discrepancies in the details, are you still optimistic that something will get done?

RICHARD: I’m highly optimistic. I think that, just to circle back on what I was saying earlier, I think that there is no question at the Capitol that this needs to happen. And that’s a really great place to start a discussion. If we have an agreement that we need to answer this question, then we can get straight to how we’re going to answer that question. And that’s where the discussion is right now.

KJZZ's The Show transcripts are created on deadline. This text is edited for length and clarity, and may not be in its final form. The authoritative record of KJZZ's programming is the audio record.

Mark Brodie is a co-host of The Show, KJZZ’s locally produced news magazine. Since starting at KJZZ in 2002, Brodie has been a host, reporter and producer, including several years covering the Arizona Legislature, based at the Capitol.
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