A proposal to end partisan primaries will be on voters’ ballots in November, but it’s still unclear whether their votes will actually count.
If they approve Proposition 140, it would amend the Arizona Constitution to create an open primary system in which all candidates for federal, state, and local offices would compete in a single primary, rather than separate partisan elections. These primaries would include candidates with no political affiliation.
The proposal, known as the Make Arizona Elections Fair Act, would allow all registered voters to choose from any candidate in the primary, and the candidates with the most votes would advance to the general election, even if they do not represent another party.
The Arizona Supreme Court last week declared that the ballot measure was constitutionalrejected a lawsuit filed by the Republican and Democratic parties and ordered election officials to place Proposition 140 on the ballot. This order came just before the deadlines counties had to meet to submit ballots for printing.
However, another appeal against the signatures collected to put the law on the ballot has not yet been completed.
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Now it is a matter of determining whether the approximately 40,000 signatures that have already been classified as valid are actually duplicates that would jeopardize the inclusion of the law in the ballot. A judge of the court of first instance had previously ruled against the signature challenge and determined that there were around 32,000 more petition signatures than necessary for Bill 140.
But the Arizona Supreme Court said the lower court judge wrongly refused to consider evidence that plaintiffs said showed tens of thousands of duplicate signatures. It ordered the judge to reopen the case and review the evidence to determine whether Proposition 140 had the signatures needed to go before voters in November.
And even though the deadline to change the ballot content has passed, the Supreme Court said voters’ ability to cast their vote on Prop. 140 remains uncertain.
“We also recognize the desire for certainty. But the role of the courts is to dispense justice. Courts cannot be forced to rush to judgment to meet a deadline for printing ballots or to provide certainty to the parties,” Chief Judge Ann Scott Timmer wrote in the court’s Aug. 23 order.
There is little doubt that the case will end up back in the Supreme Court after the court evaluates the alleged duplicate signatures. If the final ruling is that the Make Arizona Elections Fair Act did not receive enough signatures, the court will issue a preliminary injunction prohibiting the counting of all votes for the measure.
“If the court dismisses the plaintiffs’ complaint, voters will decide whether the initiative should go into effect. If the court disqualifies the initiative, it should issue an injunction preventing votes for the measure from being counted,” Timmer wrote.
After an emergency hearing last week, the trial will not resume until September 3.
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