Journalists’ Roundtable: Attorney General Mayes sues County Recorder Heap, campaign funding and more

It’s Friday, which means it’s time for the Journalists’ Roundtable, where we discuss Arizona politics. This week, “Arizona Horizon” host Ted Simons was joined by Dennis Welch of AZ Family (CBS5 News/ 3TV), Wayne Schutsky from KJZZ and Camryn Sanchez of KJZZ.

The topics discussed this week included:

• Attorney General Kris Mayes and other Arizona officials are pushing for the voting rights of 25 U.S. citizens to be restored after being incorrectly flagged by Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap
• Campaign finance reports show incumbent candidate Governor Katie Hobbs spent $12 million more on campaign funding than Republican opponent Andy Biggs
• CD4 candidate Tammy Caputi said her campaign has received an onslaught of death threats in a recent Facebook post

Camryn Sanchez: “You asked us months ago, when they finally had settled before the primary, if that was the end of the dispute between the Recorder’s office and the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors office, and we all said, ‘No, something else will come up.’ Surely enough, a few things have come up. One of the most incendiary things recently was the Recorder’s office going after election workers and accusing them of being suspicious and forwarding that complaint to the FBI. The Recorder’s office and the elections office are both concerned about everything that can go wrong being pinned on them in the upcoming election, so I think her concern is valid considering how things have been going.”

Wayne Schutsky: “We had a little reprieve for a few months where it seemed like they might be getting along enough to run this election, then all of this happened. There have been some reports of voters not getting their ballots, but we’re not sure what the issue is. We know the issue is not what Recorder Heap said, which is that a processing center here got closed, which is not true, and stuff’s not getting routed in San Diego. On the FBI issue, you hear the phrase, ‘This could’ve been an email.’ I think that’s what a lot of folks on the elections department side say. This started as a viral video on the internet, started by a conspiracy theory group saying these two people working in the election center were doing something wrong. It was a very easily dispelled thing; it instead gets referred to the FBI, who then gives it to the Arizona Attorney General’s office, who then calls the County and asks, ‘Were these people allowed to be there?’ Turns out, they were. The Recorder’s office could’ve just done that and circumvented this whole thing. Instead, they decided to make this a big deal.”

Jeremy Duda: “Either way, it is a pretty bad look, especially considering this long-running history of fights that they’ve had over what’s not even been two years. That was a pretty provocative act, especially considering where this allegation came from: a known election denier, someone who’s been spreading baseless conspiracy theories for years. As Wayne mentioned, this could’ve been cleared up really easily. It seems, to the Board, especially antagonistic and really going out of his way to be antagonistic. This is all happening two weeks before the election; the timing on this is not great.”