Arizona Initiative Requiring Disclosure of Campaign Contributions Faces Challenges

A judge has ruled that an Arizona initiative expanding voting access and rolling back a host of restrictions enacted by the Republican-controlled Arizona legislature and Gov. Doug Ducey will be on the November ballot.

With enough qualifying signatures, the court allowed the Voters Right to Know Act to be on the ballot, which will require disclosure of who is funding political campaigns by requiring any organization spending more than $5,000 on campaigns to identify all donors, with big penalties for failing to do so.

Another measure was removed from the ballot.  The Free and Fair Elections measure would have changed a slew of election laws, including blocking the legislature from overturning the results of presidential elections, an avenue some Republicans explored after former President Donald Trump’s loss in the state in 2020. It also would have guaranteed ballot privacy and barred handing election materials or ballots over to outside groups like the state Senate did after 2020, expanded voting access, mandated that all voters can go to any polling site, extended early voting and limited lobbyists’ ability to entertain lawmakers.