The 2024 presidential race, Arizona’s congressional races and potentially several abortion-related measures command a lot of attention this election year. But there’s another set of really important races that are also on the ballot: the Legislature.

Republicans have two-seat majorities in both the Arizona House and Senate. That means if Democrats could make a net gain of even one seat in either chamber, Arizona would have a divided government that mirrors the house and senate in washington. And if they pick up control in both chambers, well, that would be the first time since the 1960s, so we can only wonder what that might be like in this long-red state.

In this episode of The Gaggle, hosts Ron Hansen and Mary Jo Pitzl sit down with The Republic's Ray Stern to discuss where Democrats have to win if they really intend to flip control of the Legislature and who is trying to do it. But first, in several key districts, we have to get through some competitive primary races. 

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Republicans have always had the numerical advantage in Arizona. A little more than a third of the state is registered with the GOP. But Republicans have slowly yet steadily lost ground to Democrats in this state. Why is that?

It's more than just changing demographics.

In this episode of The Gaggle, hosts Ron Hansen and Mary Jo Pitzl sit down with Samara Klar, a political science professor at the University of Arizona to tease apart Arizona voter's preferences.

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In a U.S. Senate race often dominated by Republican front runner Kari Lake, it’s easy to forget that Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb is running for the GOP nomination, too. He’s got a low-key demeanor and his personal style doesn’t seem to linger the way Lake’s combative politics does.

When Lake entered the Senate race in November with former President Donald Trump’s prominent endorsement, many people thought the nominating race was over. But Lamb has stuck around.

In this episode of The Gaggle, Sheriff Lamb shares his views in an exclusive interview on the 1864 abortion law, why he wouldn’t have voted for Senator Kyrsten Sinema’s bipartisan border security bill and ultimately why he wants your vote on the July 30 primary.

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On Wednesday, April 24th, Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes shared a video on X, formerly Twitter, announcing that 11 Arizona Republicans and seven others have been charged for falsely certifying that Donald Trump won the state in 2020. This is despite of the fact that Arizonans narrowly favored Joe Biden. 

While the names of those charged have yet to be officially revealed, clues in the the 58 page indictment make it clear that the architects of Trump's national campaign to steal the election are also facing charges in Arizona. Some of those individuals appear to be Trump lawyers Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman, former chief of staff Mark Meadows, lawyers Jenna Ellis and Christina Bobb, and Trump advisers Boris Epshteyn and Michael Roman.

Trump, who is asking voters to return him to the White House this year, is “unindicted coconspirator 1,” according to the indictment.

In this special episode of The Gaggle, state politics reporters Mary Jo Pitzl and Stacey Barchenger sit down at The Republic's capitol bureau to hash out what we know from the indictment and what may happen next. 

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Artificial intelligence is a booming business. With a few dollars anyone can create a deep faked voice online. ChatGPT and other AI writing programs can take a student essay and polish it to a Ph.D. level. Manipulated videos can show an official saying or doing something outrageous -- and fake.

With such powerful technology at everyone's fingertips the question arises: how can we keep our election systems safe from bad actors using AI?

In this episode, our election dissectors, Mary Jo Pitzl and Sasha Hupka, speak with Don Palmer, the vice chair of the Election Assistance Commission. This is a bipartisan commission that was created by the Help America Vote Act of 2002, and it is tasked with certifying voting systems across the country. It also supports state and local election officials in their efforts to ensure accessible, accurate and secure elections.

Palmer explains both the pros and cons of AI and why it's important to set parameters on how it can be used. You will also hear an example of deep faked voices of our hosts. Listen closely and see if you can tell the AI from the real voices.

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In her second year, Gov. Katie Hobbs has used her veto stamp much less than her first year.

By this time last year, the Democratic governor had denied a record-breaking 63 bills presented by the GOP-dominated Legislature. This year, Hobbs is at 42 vetoes.

Her second red stamp came across House Bill 2570, or the Arizona Starter Homes Act. Introduced by Rep. Leo Biasiucci, R-Lake Havasu City, it was intended to make homebuilding more efficient and thus more affordable.

But Hobbs said the bill couldn’t guarantee affordable home prices. She argued it went too far because it cut much of the local control cities have over development.

This week on The Gaggle, a politics podcast by The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, host Mary Jo Pitzl is joined by housing expert Mark Stapp, the Fred E Taylor professor of real estate at the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University. He says the solution is more complicated than it seems.

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On Tuesday, April 9, the Arizona state Supreme Court ruled to uphold near total-ban on abortions dating back to 1864.

After the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, the exact parameters for Arizona went into question. Just months before, then-Governor Republican Doug Ducey signed a law that limited abortions to the first 15 weeks of pregnancy. In 1973, when Roe v. Wade went into effect nationally, Arizona had an abortion law dating back to its territorial days.

So the question became: which ruling would be the law of the land in Arizona? At the time, the state Court of Appeals overruled and instated the 15-week law. This week, the Arizona Supreme Court reversed this decision, allowing the 19th century law to take affect.

Today on The Gaggle, hosts Ron Hansen and Mary Jo Pitzl dissect Arizona's new, but ancient, abortion law and how it will impact the state politically and legally.

First, state politics reporter Stacey Barchenger joins the podcast to break down why the justices allowed at 160-year law to stand and who will benefit politically from the decision.

Later, University of Richmond law professor Carl Tobias joins The Gaggle to investigate the legal fallout from the court's decision.

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Imagine there is a ballot with several candidates seeking the same seat. And you like most of them. But you can only pick one because that’s what the rules require. 

When that happens, the vote in a multi-candidate race is split – and the outcome often is the candidate you least like wins.

This is called vote splitting, a phenomenon that happens when a race attracts at least three candidates who have similar positions or maybe similar demographics. This makes it attractive for a contrasting candidate to benefit from the divided vote and prevail.

It’s happened time and again across the nation and here in Arizona.

Think Paul Gosar. He emerged from an eight-candidate field in 2010 to win the GOP primary in a heavily Republican district. It cemented his standing as an incumbent and he hasn’t lost since.

There’s a move afoot to stop vote splitting by introducing “approval voting,” a system where voters could vote for all of the candidates in a given race who appeal to them. And they could do that without ranking them. This is something the Center for Election Science, a national, nonpartisan nonprofit focused on voting reform, is pushing.

In this episode of The Gaggle, Mary Jo Pitzl examines the effect of vote-splitting, the potential issues it can cause, and some of the unintended consequences of the practice. You'll also hear about the related practice of ticket splitting, which factored prominently played a big role in the 2022 general election. 

Joining Pitzl via Zoom are Nina Taylor, the organization’s CEO, and Chris Raleigh, director of advocacy and communication and a specialist in campaign management. 

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Trust in the election system in Arizona is eroding. Some may even say it's broken all together. One side says the vulnerability of voting machines and delay in election results is what makes the system distrustful. This was most obvious during the Maricopa County recount of the 2020 ballots that lasted months.

The other side says it's the new found distrust in the system that makes it broken.

But either way a question remains among most American, and specifically Arizonan, voters: how can we make elections better?

This question fuels the work of David Becker. He is a co-founder of the Center for Election Innovation and Research and he believes that technology and reliance on data can help us toward improving elections. He also helped launch the Election Official Legal Defense Network, which connections election officials with free legal advice.

This week on Election Dissection, an elections series of The Gaggle podcast by The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, hosts Mary Jo Pitzl and Sasha Hupka sit down with Becker to discuss why he's confident in the safety of our elections systems, how America ended up in this position and why he's keeping an eye on those who oppose Donald Trump come next January.

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Rents in Arizona have jumped significantly since the pandemic. In 2021, metro Phoenix made national headlines when rents skyrocketed by 30%. An investigation by the Arizona Attorney General's office reveals that a group of nine landlord companies have been using a software that allows them to see what other properties are charging and thereby "fix" their rental prices to match. Attorney General Kris Mayes is not having it and is seeking restitution for those affected. But that could take years. What about renters who need help now?

In this episode of The Gaggle, producer Amanda Luberto sits down with Stacey Barchenger, our state politics reporter, and Catherine Reagor who covers real estate issues. They hash out what could happen and what resources renters have access to right now.

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