Sen. Rios on “Repeal and replace” and more

On Monday, a senate committee revived a house bill that would eliminate early voting. On Tuesday a Yavapai county superior court ruled the provision replacing precinct committeemen elections with appointments unconstitutional. Now, lawmakers are trying to circumvent a voter referendum by repealing and replacing a tax cut with a flat rate, dubbed “repeal and replace”. We spoke with senate minority leader Rebecca Rios for that and more.

“This repeal and replace is essentially an outright contempt towards the voters of Arizona.”

She said Ducey and Republicans are wanting to call a special session to repeal a $2 billion tax cut that largely benefits the wealthiest Arizonans and change the language just enough so it cannot show up on the ballot for voters to repeal or amend. This is an attempt to circumvent an initiative parents and teachers led, where they gathered over 200,000 signatures in the Arizona heat, to get the $2 billion tax cut on the ballot for voters to decide what to do with, she said.

Essentially, Republican lawmakers are attempting to repeal a tax cut, which would remove it from the ballot altogether. Then they would replace it with something almost identical, which Arizonans would then have to start over and collect new signatures to get the new tax cut on the ballot. Once on the ballot, voters would then decide the fate of the tax cut, which Rios said the $2 billion would be released as rebates, once again disproportionately benefitting the wealthy, instead of being used for Arizona education or other funds.

“The republicans don’t want voters showing up at the ballot to make that decision. It begs the question, why?” she said, adding that she believes Republicans “know darn well that voters would never vote to pass $2 billion worth of tax-payer tax cuts to folks that are largely not going to benefit unless they are in the top one percent.”

Rios added that “it’s a slap in the face to voters.”