The legislative propositions and citizen initiatives on the ballot this year range from an initiative that would open primary elections to all registered voters, to a proposition that would enable the state to arrest and deport immigrants. But the effort most likely to succeed comes from the group Arizona for Abortion Access.
The Arizona Abortion Access Act, which would amend the state constitution, will likely be certified for the November ballot considering that organizers gathered what has been cited as a record 823,685 signatures (only 383,923 are required). The group used 7,000 volunteers and thousands of circulators to collect signatures from voters in all 15 counties, people of every political stripe. Seven states have already passed similar initiatives, and this year Florida and Maryland will have abortion rights on the ballot too. Along with Arizona, seven other states will likely have constitutional amendments guaranteeing abortion access up for votes.
Two other citizen-initiated measures are expected to qualify for our state ballot — the Eliminate Partisan Primaries Amendment (aka Make Elections Fair Arizona) and the Minimum Wage Increase Initiative (One Fair Wage), which would raise rates from $14.35 to $18 per hour and amend state statutes accordingly.
If the three citizen initiatives make it to the ballot, they’ll be added to 11 propositions passed by our Republican-led legislature, three of which are designed to counter the citizen initiatives, such as one requiring partisan primary elections. Two others, Props. 134 and 136, are meant to make it harder to do citizen-led initiatives. Another appears to be trying to get around federal immigration law.
Abortion shows up as an issue again as the subtext for Prop. 137, which would end term limits for state supreme-court justices and superior-court judges. The initiative is a response to public anger toward the justices who voted in favor of upholding the state’s 1864 abortion law. Abortion-rights groups are advocating a “no” vote for Associate Justice Clint Bolick and Associate Justice Kathryn H. King, both of whom are up for retention votes this year.
The legislature passed them as ballot initiatives because Republican leaders know that Governor Katie Hobbs would probably veto regular legislative bills.
Another 32 proposed measures did not qualify for this already lengthy ballot.
A group called Foes of Proposition 314 is fighting in the state Supreme Court to have the anti-immigrant legislative initiative thrown off the ballot because it includes two diverse issues. Along with allowing the state arrest of border-crossers, the initiative would increase penalties for selling fentanyl when its use results in death.
Ballotpedia.org lists our legislature-led propositions:
Prop. 133: Require partisan primary elections for partisan offices.
Prop. 134: Create a signature-distribution requirement for citizen-initiated ballot measures based on state legislative districts, meaning such measures would have to gather proportional numbers of signatures in every district.
Prop. 135: Provide for the legislature to terminate a state of emergency or alter the emergency powers of the governor during a state of emergency, and automatically terminate any emergency powers granted to the governor 30 days after the emergency is proclaimed, unless the legislature extends them, and excepting states of emergency related to war, flooding or fire.
Prop. 136: Provide for challenges to an initiative measure or constitutional amendment after its filing with the secretary of state.
Prop. 137: End term limits for state supreme-court justices and superior-court judges, replacing them with terms of good behavior, unless decided otherwise by a judicial review commission, and end routine retention elections at the end of judicial terms, instead providing for such elections under specific circumstances.
Prop. 138: Allow employers to pay tipped workers 25% less per hour than the minimum wage if the tips received by the employee are not less than the minimum wage plus $2 for all hours worked.
Prop. 311: Establish a $20 fee on every conviction for a criminal offense, which would go into a fund to pay a benefit of $250,000 to the family of any first-responder killed in the line of duty.
Prop. 312: Allow property owners to apply for property-tax refunds in certain circumstances, including in cases where the property’s city or locality does not enforce laws regarding illegal camping, loitering, obstructing public thoroughfares, panhandling, public urination or defecation, public consumption of alcoholic beverages, or possession or use of illegal substances.
Prop. 313: Provide for life imprisonment for any individual convicted of sex-trafficking a child.
Prop. 314: Allow state and local police to arrest non-citizens who cross the border unlawfully, allow state judges to order deportations, require the use of the E-verify program for some public governmental programs and employment-eligibility purposes, and make the knowing sale of fentanyl resulting in the death of another person a Class 2 felony.
Prop. 315: Prohibit a proposed rule from becoming effective if that rule is projected to increase regulatory cost by more than $500,000 within five years after implementation, till the legislature enacts legislation ratifying the proposed rule.
