Journalists’ Roundtable: State budget clashes, foreign ownership of land bill and more

It’s Friday, which means it is time for another edition of Journalists’ Roundtable. This week, “Arizona Horizon” host Steve Goldstein was joined by Wayne Schutsky of KJZZ, Howie Fischer of Capitol Media Services and Jeremy Duda of Axios.

This week’s topics included:

• State budget disagreement between House and Senate Republicans
• Gov. Hobbs proposes legislation on foreign ownership of Arizona land following veto of lawmakers’ bill
• GOP Corporation Commission candidates announce primary challenge
• Former lawmaker Austin Smith indicted on forged signature charges
• Arizona Democratic Party infighting and meeting post-mortem
• Gov. Hobbs vetoes anti-Semitism bill
• Axon breaks off negotiations with Scottsdale on HQ

On state budget disagreement between House and Senate Republicans:

Jeremy Duda: “We hear about how they’ve [House and Senate Republicans] not been on the same page and they’re not negotiating together with the Governor, they’re meeting separately with the Governor’s office which is pretty bizarre.”

Howie Fischer: “What may have to happen is they may have to take the House plan and put it up in the Senate, and say see you don’t have the votes here, and then you can tell the House Republicans no this isn’t gonna work so let’s start over. Again, it’s a question of who believes what they can get through.”

Wayne Schutsky: “Fiscal responsibility is in the eye of the beholder. I would imagine everyone kinda has these federal cuts on the mind. Democrats aren’t psyched about it but I think even the Governor has that on the mind, and so I don’t think they’re gonna go out of they’re way to overspend like we saw a few years ago.”

On Arizona Democratic Party infighting and meeting post-mortem:

Jeremy Duda: “In the end, you just don’t want this distraction if you’re either party. The democrats have some high hopes of retaining statewide offices next year, taking control of the legislature as they’ve been wanting to do for many years. And the more people are focusing on this infighting, theoretically that makes things a bit more difficult.”

Howie Fischer: “If this continues, and [Chairman Robert] Branscomb becomes someone who no one trusts, there’s not gonna be any money in the party.”

Wayne Schutsky: “Democrats really need all the headwinds going in their direction to win statewide in Arizona. There was a lot of talk of Arizona being a purple state after 2022, when they won all those races like the Governor’s office. But voter registration bore out, it’s a Republican state, and they benefited from all the discord in the Republican party. Now that it’s in their party, it’s not gonna help their chances.”