Arizona Morning Briefing, 9-29: Eight Illegal Voters, Scottsdale Axon Opponents File Appeal, Treasurer’s Race Gets Dirty, and More

•EIGHT NONCITIZENS VOTE, DEMOCRACY IS IN DANGER–Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap’s dramatic noncitizen SAVE database sweep of the voter rolls ended up flagging 60 voting “noncitizens”, Votebeat reported yesterday. Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell announced Monday afternoon that her office finished reviewing the audit. Fifty-two turned out to be U.S. citizens; eight were legal residents who weren’t citizens. Seven of those eight appear to have registered while renewing driver’s licenses. The eighth filled out a paper form that actually said he was not a citizen and nevertheless wound up registered. Mitchell announced no charges, and said no more than three of the eight voted in any one election. Scandalous!

•AXON FIGHT GOES TO THE COURT OF APPEALS–Opponents of Axon’s giant Scottsdale headquarters development project filed their appeal Monday, asking the Arizona Court of Appeals to strike down the 2025 state law that effectively insulated the development from a voter referendum. They’re arguing the law is unconstitutional special legislation: despite its supposed statewide purpose, its population limits make it applicable to just five Arizona cities. The trial judge acknowledged the statute was “clearly triggered” by Axon’s zoning fight but upheld it. The question is: Will Scottsdale voters actually have a say in this?

•DEAF JAM–The Auditor General dropped three reports Monday on the Arizona State Schools for the Deaf and the Blind. Among the findings: ASDB graduated students who hadn’t met graduation requirements, couldn’t demonstrate that it had conducted background checks on some employees, failed to investigate some complaints promptly, couldn’t show that substitutes and other staff met required qualifications, and moved toward relocating its Tucson campus without adequately assessing student impacts or getting formal board approval. A separate forensic audit says it failed to reliably bill and collect for services, estimated at $2.1 million.

•A TREASURY OF OPPO RESEARCH–KAWC in Yuma reported on the dirty election war between Democrat Nick Mansour and Republican Elijah Norton for state treasurer. Mansour’s side has a “Never Norton” site cataloguing more than 100 lawsuits involving Norton’s vehicle-warranty businesses. Norton’s campaign has “Con Man Mansour,” hitting Mansour over litigation and a 36-month nursing-board probation involving Arizona College of Nursing, where he was an executive. Both dispute the implications of the other’s attacks. Norton has raised $3.2 million, $2.9 million of it his own money, but burned almost all of it in the primary and reported about $44,200 cash. Mansour reported about $842,000. Who would you trust with your state’s money?