by admin | Jan 29, 2026 | Arizona, News and Updates
For years, the Left has been working tirelessly to flip Arizona blue. Armed with a secret network of tax-advantaged funds, political nonprofits, and union dollars, their aim has been to turn our beloved, freedom-loving state into the next Colorado or California. In fact, many groups on the Left waged high stakes to flip Republicans’ paper-thin control of the state legislature in 2024.
And how did that turn out? A historic landslide victory for President Trump while the Left actually lost ground in Arizona’s legislature. Apparently funneling millions of dollars to liberal causes doesn’t make up for bad ideas.
Now, with the 2026 midterm election a little over nine months away, the latest voter registration numbers are in, and they show an encouraging trend. Republicans have expanded their registration advantage over Democrats to 7.64%—the largest lead in state history—while Democrats continue their free fall in party registration.
Even more impressive is that these gains are not isolated to a few particular areas of our state. Every single county in Arizona has become MORE Republican since the 2024 election. That’s right. In the counties where Democrats have larger voter registration numbers than Republicans, the gap has closed. And in counties where Republicans have larger voter registration numbers than Democrats, the gap has widened. In fact, the gap between registered Republicans and Democrats in Maricopa County has increased by more than half a percent in just the past year.
Yet perhaps the most surprising trend behind this growing Republican advantage is that while Republicans have been able to register a lot of new voters, the same cannot be said for the Democrats. As of today, Democrats have fewer registered voters in Arizona than they had six years ago! And this occurred at a time when Arizona’s population grew by nearly 500,000 residents. That’s the price you pay when your party continues to push unpopular ideas like the Green New Scam all while featuring a scandal-plagued governor who vetoes $1.1 billion in tax relief.
All of this is good news for Republicans who enjoy a voter registration gap that’s now 3.5% larger than the last midterm election in 2022 when that advantage stood at 4.06%. But here’s the thing. These voter registration numbers are moot if Republicans fail to show up in November.
While there has been a lot of discussion about election malfeasance and fraud in 2022, one of the most overlooked issues has been that Republicans grossly underperformed in turnout. In fact, Republican turnout in 2022 was lower than it was in the 2018 midterms.
That can’t happen this year.
Right now, Arizona has an attorney general in Kris Mayes who has suggested that people can shoot ICE officers because of stand your ground laws. We have a secretary of state in Adrian Fontes who continues to prove that the only thing he’s good at is losing in court. And we have a governor under active criminal investigation for a massive pay-to-play scheme with our tax dollars who wants to end school choice, increase government spending, veto bills that lower taxes, and more. Since she took office, she’s led Arizona from 4th in the nation in job growth all the way down to 47th. She’s vetoed parental rights bills, 2nd Amendment bills, water legislation, and more. And her fiscal mismanagement has turned a $2.5 billion surplus into a $1.4 billion deficit. In the meantime, Republicans continue to fight for educational freedom, address affordability, and put money back into the pockets of the people.
That’s the right side of history, but it won’t be if we don’t show up.
The goal for 2026 should be a presidential election level turnout, which would all but ensure Republican victories up and down the ticket. And if that happens, we can send Mayes, Hobbs, and Fontes packing for good. Maybe they can find a nice, overpriced home in California.
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by admin | Jan 27, 2026 | Arizona, News and Updates
What’s being sold as a harmless planning document is actually a blueprint to fundamentally reshape how West Mesa residents live and move about their city. The MesaCONNECTED Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) Plan has been in the works since 2021. Funded by a federal grant from the Federal Transit Administration (FTA), the plan covers a five-mile “transit corridor” in West Mesa and is intended to guide future land-use decisions in that area. At first glance, it appears benign, seemingly focused on growth and beautification. City officials repeatedly emphasize that it is not a transit plan and does not initiate any specific projects. However, taken as a whole, MesaCONNECTED lays the groundwork to transform West Mesa into what is effectively a 15-minute city (or even a 5-minute city, by their own standards) without explicitly using that label.
The plan draws inspiration from communities in Oregon and California, as well as Arizona’s own Tempe Cul-De-Sac neighborhood, all of which follow planning models that prioritize density, transit-oriented development, and reduced automobile use. The stated goal is to create fully walkable areas centered around “transit nodes” while making existing transit easier to access. The section of West Mesa encompassed in the plan includes major hubs such as Mesa Riverview, the Asian District, Mesa Community College, Banner Desert Medical Center, Downtown Mesa, and surrounding areas.
A central objective of the plan is to increase density and place housing closer to employment to “reduce vehicle miles traveled” (pg. 5). This is not a neutral goal. It assumes driving is a problem to be corrected rather than a freedom to be preserved. In a city like Mesa where families rely on personal vehicles for work, school, church, medical care, and more, designing communities to deliberately discourage driving punishes the very behavior that allowed the city to grow in the first place. Rather than responding to how residents already live, the plan attempts to reshape daily habits by making driving less practical and alternative modes more “convenient.”
During the plan’s initial phase, the city collected public feedback to help shape its direction. At a Mesa City Council Study Session on December 4, 2025, officials claimed the plan reflects what the public wants. However, Councilmember Taylor acknowledged that survey participation was extremely low relative to the number of residents contacted, so low that the results are inherently skewed. It is misleading and dishonest to claim broad public support. Most Mesa residents likely have no idea this plan exists, let alone that it could influence future development decisions affecting their neighborhood.
Despite repeated assurances that this is not a transit plan by city officials, the vision is inseparable from “future transit investments” and long-term projects (pg. 2). The framework assumes higher-capacity transit will be built eventually, and that land-use decisions today must be shaped to support it tomorrow. This pattern is familiar nationwide: a so-called “non-binding” study plan establishes justification for density, rezoning, and infrastructure changes, to make expensive transit projects appear inevitable rather than optional.
All of these ideas come from the concept of a 15-minute city which aims to keep any daily necessity within a short walk, bike ride or transit ride. While marketed as convenience, this model opens the door to government overreach by centralizing daily life into tightly managed zones. International examples show how easily these concepts can move from theory to enforcement. In parts of England, residents have already faced fines for driving outside designated areas, demonstrating how mobility “suggestions” can evolve into mobility restrictions.
The plan openly seeks to “limit sprawl” (pg. 36), framing the true American dream as a problem. Larger homes, private yards, safer neighborhoods, affordable housing, and the freedom to come and go as they please is painted negatively. Restricting outward growth concentrates density, raises costs, and pushes people into cramped apartments where they will “own nothing and be happy.” The plan embraces this model, aiming for a 5-minute city: homes, jobs, shops, and services all packed into tightly controlled nodes (pg. 38), compressing daily life into a series of crowded, artificial districts. So not even a 15-minute city is sufficient.
Although the Mesa City Council was scheduled to discuss the TOD plan earlier this January, heavy opposition from residents and activists led to its removal from the agenda. That victory should not invite complacency. Study plans signal direction. They show where the city intends to go long before binding votes are taken. Mesa residents should remain vigilant. These plans resurface quietly, often rebranded and reframed. Community engagement is essential to ensuring that centralized, coercive planning models do not take root in Mesa under the guise of “connectivity” or “choice.”
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by admin | Jan 20, 2026 | Arizona, News and Updates
At a time when Arizonans are still struggling to recover from years of Biden-era inflation, Republican lawmakers acted swiftly to deliver on their Affordable Arizona agenda. On just the fourth day of the legislative session, they passed SB1106, a tax conformity package that delivered the full benefits of the One Big Beautiful Bill (OBBB) to Arizona taxpayers, families, and businesses. The legislation provided $1.1 billion in tax relief and, just as importantly, immediate certainty for millions of Arizonans heading into tax season.
The very next day, Governor Katie Hobbs vetoed it.
That veto leaves taxpayers facing a potential $1.1 billion tax hike and widespread chaos as filing season begins. This isn’t simply the typical tax policy fight between Democrat and Republican ideologies. But a full display of Katie Hobbs’ failure to lead.
From the outset, she has mishandled this critical issue of federal tax conformity with conflicting messages, unauthorized executive actions, and zero coordination with the Legislature or even apparently her own agencies. The result has been a self-inflicted mess, and Arizona taxpayers will be the ones to suffer the price.
The chaos began in November, when Governor Hobbs issued a truly unprecedented executive order instructing the Department of Revenue to prepare tax forms conforming to her so-called “Middle Class Tax Cuts” plan. The problem? Governors don’t write tax law. Lawmakers do. The other problem? Her package included only half of the conformity relief from the OBBB, which would leave Arizonans with a $220 million tax hike.
As tax season loomed, Republican lawmakers urged Hobbs to call a special session to fix conformity before millions of Arizonans began filing. She wouldn’t. And now chaos is unfolding. Hobbs then compounded the problem in her State of the State address by demanding immediate action on “middle-class tax relief,” even though she had done none of the basic work to make it actually happen. Not one Democrat had introduced her plan via an actual bill.
At the same time, Hobbs publicly suggested that tax conformity could be negotiated later as part of budget talks, which typically occur well after the height of tax season. These contradictory signals left everyone guessing what Hobbs actually wanted. Does she believe conformity is urgent, or can it wait months? Was her executive order meant to dictate tax policy, or was she relying on future legislative action after all? Perhaps Hobbs herself doesn’t really know.
To make matters worse, her own Department of Revenue even further highlighted her dysfunction. DOR testified to a joint committee of the House and Senate, hearing the Republican-conformity plan (an actual introduced bill), that it issued tax forms assuming full federal conformity because no law existed directing them otherwise. They warned that if the state does not fully conform, more than one million taxpayers will be forced to refile amended returns, requiring the agency to hire roughly 200 additional employees just to process the backlog.
Hobbs’ public response to this implicating testimony was erratic. She began distancing herself from her own Department once it became clear that DOR had followed precedence rather than her directive. The irony was hard to miss. The same governor who assumed legislative authority she did not have, tried to abandon executive responsibility altogether.
Republicans, by contrast, responsibly moved with urgency to resolve this very real and pressing issue. Their tax conformity plan, introduced as SB1106, delivered the full benefit of the OBBB, making permanent key provisions of President Trump’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, increasing the standard deduction, eliminating taxes on tips and overtime, and providing $1.1 billion in tax relief. The bill was also tailored specifically to Arizona. Because Arizona already exempts Social Security from taxes, the senior deduction was adjusted to begin at age 60 rather than 65. It included retirement savings vehicles such as IRAs and 401(k)s as well as pensions and allowed deductions for Roth IRA contributions, incentivizing young workers to save for the future. A 25-year-old who invested just $100 a month into a Roth IRA could retire with at least $1 million by age 65.
This package delivered affordability and certainty. Hobbs vetoed it anyway.
This disaster was easily avoided. Governor Hobbs refused to call a special session before tax season, despite Republican lawmakers pleading with her to do so. She issued an executive order directing actions she had no authority to enforce. She had no bill introduced by her own caucus. She had no support for her package. She sent contradictory messages about urgency and delay. Her own Department of Revenue issued tax forms that reflect neither her plan nor the Legislature’s alternatives. And when Republicans finally delivered a comprehensive solution on the fourth day of session, (which would have conveniently gotten her out of the mess she made), she vetoed it.
Now Arizonans are filing taxes using forms that assume full conformity. Unless Chaos Katie changes her mind, many of those taxpayers will be forced to refile, incurring additional costs, delays, and frustration.
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Arizona needs to have a unified voice promoting economic freedom and prosperity, and the Free Enterprise Club is committed to making that happen. But we can’t do it alone. We need YOU!
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by admin | Jan 15, 2026 | Arizona, News and Updates
Over the past month, Minnesota has been hard at work to set the gold standard for jaw-dropping fraud scandals under the watch of Democrat Governor Tim Walz. The Somali daycare scandal has turned the state into a national punchline—hundreds of millions in taxpayer dollars stolen in plain sight while Kamala Harris’ favorite “masculine” governor looked the other way.
Now, with Walz stepping aside from this reelection bid, a new contender for “most scandal-plagued governor on the 2026 ballot” has emerged: Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs. While Minnesota’s scandals have dominated headlines, Hobbs has been busy compiling a rap sheet that rivals what happened in the Land of 10,000 Lakes. But unlike Walz, Hobbs and her administration are under active criminal investigation.
A Pay-to-Play Scheme Engulfs the Hobbs Administration
The list of Hobbs’ scandals is a mile long and begins at the start of her tenure as governor. At that time, Hobbs set up a shady slush fund to provide donors with a conduit to buy political favor from her administration. While setting up and managing the fund, Hobbs illegally used public resources—like the state’s website—to solicit money for her inauguration. And she also tried to stop the disclosure of the names of those who donated to her inaugural fund.
After immense political pressure, Hobbs finally released the names of the donors. One of the names of the groups on the list was Sunshine Residential Homes Inc., a for-profit company that contracts with the State of Arizona. Sunshine Residential donated $100,000 to the secret fund, which was suspicious enough. But after some additional digging by local reporters, an even deeper level of corruption was revealed—an alleged pay-to-play scheme between Hobbs and the group home.
According to the report, it turns out Sunshine Residential Homes doled out $400,000 to the Arizona Democratic Party, Hobbs’ gubernatorial campaign committee, and her aforementioned inaugural fund. Hobbs and her campaign finance manager even arranged a dinner with the government contractor to meet with the CEO in private.
After making the large donations, Sunshine was granted a 30 percent increase in their rates at a time when the Arizona Department of Child Safety cut loose 16 providers! On top of that, no other standard group home provider received a rate increase. This arrangement ensured that Sunshine Residential would receive millions in additional revenue at the taxpayers’ expense.
Hobbs’ is currently under three separate criminal investigations for this pay-to-play scheme, but it’s not the only financial scandal we’ve seen during her reign as governor.
Agency Fraud Runs Rampant Under Katie Hobbs
Earlier this year, one of the largest Medicaid fraud scandals in state history came to light when it was discovered that the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS) had been rocked by more than $2 billion in fraudulent billing.
Reports tied the abuse largely to Residential Treatment Facilities—often called “sober living homes”—where patients were allegedly exploited in schemes designed to maximize profits rather than provide care. Investigators allege that some facilities bribed individuals to attend certain programs, then billed Medicaid for services that were medically unnecessary—or never provided at all.
One of the most prominent cases involved Farukh Jara Ali and occurred under the watch of Katie Hobbs. Ali—the Pakistan-based owner of ProMD—was indicted in June for submitting more than $650 million in fraudulent Medicaid claims. Not only does that money come directly from taxpayers, but the whole scheme exploited Arizona’s healthcare system at the expense of people who need real help.
Arizona’s Medicaid program isn’t the only agency that Hobbs has let turn into a playground for fraudsters. In 2023, the Arizona Department of Housing wired $2 Million to a fake NGO claiming to be providing affordable housing. A scathing report from the Auditor General found that the department lacked basic security protocols, failing to develop any wire transfer procedures that would have stopped the fraud. As of today, none of the scammers that ripped off Arizona taxpayers have been caught.
Sweetheart deals and a Jobs Program for Insiders
In addition to the agency fraud and her pay-to-play favor factory, Hobbs has developed a reputation that sweetheart deals await close friends and family members of the administration. In 2024, Governor Hobbs shelled out $700,000 for a new state logo. And who do you think received that contract? Urias Communications—a firm owned by the brother of the (at the time) Office of Tourism Director Lisa Urias.
That same year, it was discovered that Hobbs had turned her office into a jobs program for her political friends—expanding her staff by a whopping 40 percent over the previous administration. And then she followed that up this year with a handout of nearly $600,000 in taxpayer money to a former Democrat politician and her assistant for two newly created jobs.
Altogether, Katie Hobbs’ various scandals paint a damning picture of a governor who has blurred the line between public service and personal politics at every turn. While Tim Walz’s fraud crisis may have shocked the nation, the controversies surrounding Katie Hobbs cut closer to the governor’s office itself—donor favoritism, insider deals, massive fraud, and an alleged pay-to-play scheme currently under criminal investigation.
With Tim Walz pulling out of his gubernatorial race, Hobbs stands alone as the most scandal-plagued governor on the 2026 ballot. Arizona voters can’t afford to tolerate another four years of her corruption.
Help Protect Freedom in Arizona by Joining Our Grassroots Network
Arizona needs to have a unified voice promoting economic freedom and prosperity, and the Free Enterprise Club is committed to making that happen. But we can’t do it alone. We need YOU!
Join our FREE Grassroots Action List to stay up to date on the latest battles against big government and how YOU can help influence crucial bills at the Arizona State Legislature.
by admin | Jan 7, 2026 | Arizona, News and Updates
Arizona has hardly had an opportunity to recover from the aftershocks of Biden-omics. The trillions of dollars injected into the economy through the so-called Inflation Reduction Act continue to work their way through the system in the form of higher prices and eroded purchasing power. Open-border policies that expanded the labor supply at the lower and middle ends of the wage scale have depressed wages. And the Biden Administration’s unprecedented regulatory burden on industry, a nearly $2 trillion drag on the economy, will take far longer than a year to unwind and correct.
Unfortunately for Arizona, efforts to fix these problems at the federal level cannot be fully realized here at home because Katie Hobbs remains our Governor.
Hobbs has harmed Arizona’s recovery, overseeing a massive fall from 4th in the nation in job growth to 47th. She inherited a booming local economy after a Republican legislature and Governor ushered in a 2.5 percent income tax, incentivized entrepreneurs and small businesses, prioritized deregulation, and expanded choice and freedom in education. Yet Hobbs has managed to squander that opportunity. In fact, it takes a special skill set to be perfectly set up for success and then drive a working model into the ground.
And Hobbs knows she’s to blame. That’s why she’s now desperately trying to reinvent herself by pushing Trump-esque tax cut rhetoric while clinging to the same big-spending, high-tax policies that caused the damage in the first place. At her core, she remains a California-style Democrat who would rather govern Newsom-style than embrace the Republican solutions that actually work. That’s why, despite a Republican legislature that has delivered tax relief bills, more disciplined budgets, and common-sense deregulation, she has earned a reputation as the veto queen.
As a result, Arizonans are dealing with real affordability woes, and they best not hinge their hopes on Hobbs.
Despite responsible budgeting and repeated tax relief efforts by Republican lawmakers, affordability pressures continue to mount. Taxes are creeping higher at every level of government. Utility bills have surged. Housing costs are outpacing wage growth. And programs intended to help struggling families are losing billions to fraud, waste, and mismanagement.
That is why the 2026 legislative session must focus on Affordable Arizona. And Republican lawmakers already know how to confront the true drivers of cost, restore economic growth, protect taxpayers, and ensure Arizona remains a place where families can afford to live, work, and build a future.
Deliver Real Tax Relief, Not Hobbs Window Dressing
President Trump delivered historic tax relief for working families through the One Big Beautiful Bill. Arizona now has a choice: conform to the whole amount and pass that relief through to taxpayers or allow Hobbs to water it down and quietly raise taxes.
That means this session Republicans must unify behind a plan that delivers at least $420 million in meaningful tax relief, is tailored to Arizona’s needs by prioritizing workers, families, small businesses, and fixed-income retirees and ultimately avoids bad policy gimmicks like the SALT deduction, which benefits high earners in high-tax states.
Governor Hobbs has tried to rebrand herself as a tax cutter, but her conformity proposal doesn’t come close to covering the full impact of federal tax changes. Anything short of the full conformity box means Arizonans pay more in state taxes, even if they get a federal tax cut.
Stop the Local Tax Creep
Even as the Legislature has cut taxes, cities and towns across Arizona have been quietly raising them. Sales taxes, use taxes, fees, rates – local governments are stacking them year after year, erasing the gains families were supposed to feel from conservative reforms.
This local tax creep isn’t accidental. It’s the result of city councils that refuse to control spending and know taxpayers will be forced to foot the bill.
The Legislature must step in with the kinds of taxpayer affordability protections Republicans are known for such as a moratorium on local tax, rate, and fee hikes, voter approval for any local tax increase, absolute caps on local tax rates, and ending property tax hikes to support empty and underutilized schools.
Hobbs won’t be keen on choosing taxpayers over her local big-government allies, but Republican lawmakers should press ahead anyway. After all, affordability doesn’t end at the state’s income tax rate. It’s felt in every incremental tax and fee levied by local jurisdictions.
Lower Energy Costs by Stopping the Green New Scam
Arizona families are being crushed by rising utility bills. Ratepayers of the largest monopoly utility in the state have been shocked by three major rate hikes in four years with another 14% increase being proposed this year. And all of it is driven by utilities chasing expensive, unreliable “green” scam projects (and profits).
Ratepayers are paying for massive battery farms, wind, and solar projects that don’t reliably meet peak demand while pushing dependable energy offline. The result is an impending energy crisis with higher costs and less reliability.
Republicans have real solutions to this critical pocketbook issue. Reform utility resource planning to prioritize reliability and cost, allow large energy users to build their own power to reduce strain on the grid, and require utilities to meet dependable, dispatchable energy targets.
Despite Hobbs vetoing every prior attempt to protect ratepayers (and her consistent alignment with utility interests,) Republicans must make stopping these relentless rate hikes a priority. Affordable energy is the backbone of an affordable state and a major kitchen table issue for Arizonans.
Crack Down on Hobbs’ Welfare Fraud and Health Care Waste
Affordability is also undermined by billions of wasted taxpayer dollars. Arizona’s AHCCCS system alone has been rocked by more than $2 billion in fraudulent billing, including a single $650 million scheme that occurred under Katie Hobbs’ watch.
That money comes directly from taxpayers.
Whether Hobbs has been asleep at the wheel or distracted by manufacturing her own questionable pay-to-play arrangements, it’s up to Republicans to clean up her mess. That means strengthening oversight, improving fraud detection, enforcing eligibility rules, mandating regular independent audits – and continuing to investigate Hobbs’ alleged misconduct.
Every dollar stolen is a dollar that could have lowered taxes or reduced costs for families.
Hobbs is a Hinderance, But Help is on the Horizon
The 2026 legislative session is critical for Arizona.
One path leads toward California-style governance: higher taxes, higher costs, endless subsidies, and permanent dependence on government programs that only increase our state’s problems.
The other path builds upon Arizona’s proven conservative model: lower taxes, abundant energy, and accountability in public spending.
Republicans have the ideas. Republicans have the record. Now Republicans must make 2026 the session that decisively puts affordability first for today’s families and especially as we weather the last 12 months with Hobbs at the helm.
Help Protect Freedom in Arizona by Joining Our Grassroots Network
Arizona needs to have a unified voice promoting economic freedom and prosperity, and the Free Enterprise Club is committed to making that happen. But we can’t do it alone. We need YOU!
Join our FREE Grassroots Action List to stay up to date on the latest battles against big government and how YOU can help influence crucial bills at the Arizona State Legislature.
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