Rival challenges Shooter’s eligibility to run for Senate
Lawsuit claims expelled Yuma lawmaker doesn’t live in district
PHOENIX — A Republican contender for state Senate is trying to short-circuit a bid by ousted Rep. Don Shooter to get back into the Legislature.
In legal papers filed here Friday, Brent Backus contends that Shooter, going after the same seat, isn’t legally eligible to run.
Attorney Tim La Sota, who represents Backus, said that’s because Shooter changed his voter registration to a central Phoenix address in April after he was ousted from the House when his colleagues said he was guilty of sexual harassment. And that, said La Sota, means he has not lived in the district he wants to represent for a year before running, something the attorney said is a state constitutional requirement.
A hearing is set for next week in front of Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Rosa Mroz to consider the issue.
Shooter, in a written response to questions from Capitol Media Services, indicated he is not worried about the legal challenge.
“Let’s dance,” he said. And Shooter derided Backus, who lives in Waddell, a community on the western edge of the Phoenix metro area — but within the legislative district — for bringing the lawsuit.
“What is he afraid of?” Shooter said. “A little competition never hurt anybody.”
Shooter did not address questions about changing his voter registration.
He did say, “I’m traveling right now but I’ll be back in my Yuma residence next week so they could serve me there if they like,” he said.
But even if the lawsuit succeeds and Shooter is knocked off the ballot, that does not guarantee that Backus will be the Republican nominee.
Incumbent Sen. Sine Kerr of Buckeye, appointed earlier this year after Sen. Steve Montenegro resigned to run for Congress, wants a crack at a full two-year term. And Goodyear resident Royce Jenkins also is in the GOP hunt.
Whoever survives the Aug. 28 primary will go on to run against Buckeye Democrat Michelle Harris in the general election.
The sprawling District 13 runs from parts of Yuma up through Wickenburg and into Litchfield Park.
Republicans outnumber Democrats in the district by a margin of close to 2-1. But political independents make up more than a third of the registered voters.
At the heart of the challenge is a provision of the Arizona Constitution that says that those seeking to be legislators must have been a resident of the state for three years prior to election “and of the county from which he is elected at least one year before his election.”
That provision, though, dates from territorial days, when legislative seats generally were allocated on a county-by-county basis.
All that changed in the 1960s when a U.S. Supreme Court ruling required districts of roughly equal population. And with 30 districts in the state, that meant some had to cross county lines.
The place where Shooter registered to vote in Phoenix is, in fact, in Maricopa County. And LD 13 does include Maricopa County.
But La Sota is arguing that the effect of this change in how districts are drawn means the constitutional language should be read to mean that candidates must have lived in their districts for at least a year.
“The law on interpretation of the constitution is you give effect to the intent of the framers,” he said.
“The intent of the framers was clearly that members of the Legislature be from the area they represent,” La Sota continued. “There’s no getting around that.”
In his nomination papers, Shooter lists his address at 2901 S. Palo Verde Lane, Unit 44, and said he has been a resident of the district for 38 years.
And there’s another legal issue, even if the judge decides that the one-year requirement refers to the district and not the county.
The language says only that the person needs to be a resident for “at least one year before his election.” But it does not say “immediately,” which could leave open for interpretation whether the prior 38 years is sufficient.
The nature of Shooter’s residency in District 13 has been debated since the 2012 election, for which Yuma County was split between the current, GOP-dominated District 13 and predominantly Democratic District 4, which included Shooter’s then-residence.
Shooter had served one two-year term and was chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee. He announced at the time he would be leasing a residence in District 13 so he could run again.
Yuma County Democratic Party leaders announced that August they were planning to challenge his candidacy, alleging he spent most of his time at the family home, not at the condo on Palo Verde he’d rented half a mile away, but no lawsuit was ever filed.
Backus’ lawsuit includes a November 2017 warranty deed, marked “unofficial document,” showing that a house in central Phoenix purchased in Shooter’s wife’s name in 2015 had been conveyed to both of their names. Shooter had been widely rumored to spend most of his time at the Phoenix home, while his wife worked for the state Department of Education.
It also includes a copy of a voter information record showing Shooter registered as a Maricopa County voter on April 30.
Yuma radio talk show host and former county supervisor Russ Clark said Friday he had lunch with Shooter earlier that day at the Yuma Olive Garden, where they talked about the lawsuit as something routinely faced by people running for office.
“I think we both felt the same, it was fine, it’s not unexpected, it’s part of the business,” he said.
Clark said he’s not sure exactly how Shooter split his time between Phoenix and Yuma, but being part of the legislature’s GOP leadership had changed the balance. “When he was chairman, it seemed like all his time was up there because he worked year-round, but right now I see him more in Yuma because he’s not doing anything,” he said.
Yuma does have a history of legislative residency challenges. Former Rep. Russ Jones, who is now chairman of the Yuma County Republican Party Committee, nearly got Rep. Darin Mitchell taken off the general election ballot in 2012 after he defeated Jones in the primary, but the state Court of Appeals ultimately ruled the lawsuit had been improperly served to Mitchell.
Jones said Friday he won’t comment on Shooter’s residency while it’s being decided by the court system, but “the practice of this type of evading, avoiding the law and misrepresenting where people are residing, I find distasteful, dishonest.”
Candidates following just the letter of the law need to look at the intent behind its passage, he said.
Shooter has also filed a $1.3 million claim against Gov. Doug Ducey and House Speaker J.D. Mesnard over his expulsion from the House, which is expected to become a fullblown lawsuit later this month.