Longtime Phoenix area sheriff facing his toughest race ever

Taxpayers tired of Arpaio’s lawsuits

PHOENIX — The longtime sheriff of the metropolitan Phoenix area is facing his toughest political race ever to try to keep his job, with top aides under investigation for misconduct and the lawman himself facing possible criminal charges for defying an order to put an end to traffic stop patrols targeting people in the country illegally.

Joe Arpaio is now 84 but says he’s not ready for retirement, insisting his ties with Maricopa County voters who elected him six consecutive times will overcome a cascade of negative publicity from his legal troubles and give him a win against two retired law enforcement challengers and a fourth candidate in an Aug. 30 Republican primary.

He has raised nearly $10 million in campaign cash aimed at helping him keep his grip over law enforcement in one of the most populous counties in the country, much of the money from people living outside Arizona.

“There is some unfinished business that has to be done,” Arpaio said in an interview this week. “I will stand around to defend this organization, and that’s the way it is.”

Arpaio became nationally famous and infamous for his heavy-handed immigration crackdowns and for jailing prisoners in a tent city surrounded by barbed wire and issuing them pink underwear.

But he has seen his popularity wane in recent elections and faces criticism for racking up multi-million dollar legal bills to unsuccessfully defend his immigration crackdowns.

Two retired police officers who are among Arpaio’s Republican challengers call him an egoistic media monger and promise to bring more professionalism and less selfpromotion to the job.

They have an uphill battle in trying to beat Arpaio in the primary. But he is more vulnerable in the general election face-off on Nov. 8 against the race’s only Democrat, retired Phoenix police Officer Paul Penzone, said Mike O’Neil, who heads the O’Neil Associates polling firm in the Phoenix suburb of Tempe.

O’Neil said some voters who have supported Arpaio in the past may have grown tired of the hefty taxpayer bills for lawsuits challenging his immigration enforcement efforts and jail conditions.

“Law and order works unless you step over the line,” O’Neil said.