Guests – Alex Kolodin, Betsy Smith
Arizona Secretary of State Race Heats Up as Challenger Alex Kolodin Exposes Adrian Fontes' Debate Exit
Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes is facing mounting criticism after walking out of a candidate forum hosted by the Yavapai County Farm Bureau. His challenger, Alex Kolodin, joined Winn Tucson to discuss the incident and outline his vision for reforming Arizona's elections.
"I didn't know that when you get elected to Secretary of State, if you don't like the questions, you just get to leave," Kolodin remarked, setting the tone for a candid conversation about what he described as Fontes' pattern of avoiding accountability.
According to Kolodin, the forum was unexpectedly structured as a debate, providing him with a long-sought opportunity to confront Fontes directly. "I've taken him on head to head in court many times, but it was really fun to get him up on the stage and expose and press him on some of his many failures."
When the forum reached its final segment where candidates were expected to field questions from the audience, Fontes departed, leaving Kolodin to answer all remaining questions. Kolodin believes this departure reflects poorly on Fontes' commitment to voters, especially in Yavapai County where conservative values predominate.
"I think Adrian Fontes realized for the first time in his lifetime that his excuses and his lies and his attempts at deflection are no longer gonna work in this state," Kolodin asserted. "I don't think he wanted to stay and face the music."
Election Integrity Concerns Continue to Mount
The conversation shifted to recent election issues in Pima County, where reports of problematic ballots have emerged during the city council primary election. With rumors of between 350 and 1,200 incorrect ballots being distributed—some allegedly containing Congressional District 7 race information despite being for a city council election—Kolodin expressed little surprise.
"Adrian Fontes certainly thinks he's a king, but whatever King Midas was, he's the opposite. Everything he touches in elections turns to something I can't say on the radio," Kolodin stated.
He traced a pattern from Fontes' career: "He got fired by the voters of Maricopa County because our elections in Maricopa County worked decently until he got into office. As soon as he got into office, they started falling apart and it became a national drama. So, he gets fired by Maricopa County, gets immediately hired down in Pima to run your guys' elections. Now your elections are even worse than they were before."
Kolodin emphasized that Fontes has failed to fulfill his core responsibilities as Secretary of State: "All he does is not his job of trying to make sure our elections are secure, trying to make sure our voter rolls are clean, trying to make sure that counties are properly administering him. All he's doing up there is trying to help out his cronies on the radical left."
Returning to Precinct-Based Voting
A key component of Kolodin's election reform vision involves returning to precinct-based voting, which he believes would restore confidence in Arizona's electoral system.
"Precinct voting is a thing of the very recent past. We had precinct voting in Maricopa County up until 2020. 2020 was the first election we switched to the vote center model," Kolodin explained. "You're telling me that so much has changed in five years that we can't go back to the way that it was five years ago? That's absurd."
He pointed to Yavapai County as evidence of the precinct model's effectiveness: "If you look at the county where people still generally have confidence in their elections, that would be Yavapai. And that's the only county that uses precinct voting still."
According to Kolodin, Fontes has actually sued Yavapai County to force them to switch to the vote center model—a case that has reached the Arizona Supreme Court. "This guy wants to cause chaos in our elections. I can't think of any other explanation for why he's doing what he's doing and trying to strip the people of their local control."
Controversial Election Procedures Manual Under Scrutiny
A significant portion of the discussion focused on Fontes' draft Election Procedures Manual for 2025, which Kolodin characterized as radical and problematic.
"The first thing I'm gonna do [if elected] is bring people in from the grassroots to take ownership of their elections process," Kolodin promised. "People feel disenfranchised when they're disempowered. And that's what Adrian Fontes has done as Secretary of State."
Kolodin explained that the Elections Procedures Manual carries the force of law in Arizona, giving the Secretary of State substantial power over election administration. He criticized Fontes' approach to developing the manual: "He writes it in the dead of night... This time around, he's trying to make the public comment period as short as possible."
Among the controversial provisions in the draft manual, Kolodin highlighted:
DEI requirements for poll workers, mandating that county officials recruit workers reflecting the "demographic diversity" of the voting population
Requirements for external dropboxes at all polling places
Provisions that could enable non-citizens to register to vote
Restrictions on citizens' ability to criticize, question, photograph, or videotape poll workers
"What the law says is that when poll workers are recruited, the only consideration of county officials is that they have to be equally divided by party. He's trying to get around that requirement and say, 'No, actually I need you to equally divide people by race,'" Kolodin explained. "I think Americans and Arizonans are tired of being divided by race. They're tired of being divided by religion. They're tired of being divided by gender."
Kolodin encouraged listeners to review the draft manual and submit public comments before the August 29 deadline, as public input will strengthen potential legal challenges to problematic provisions.
Vision for Reform and Restoration of Confidence
Looking ahead to the 2026 election, Kolodin outlined his plans if elected Secretary of State.
His top priority is grassroots involvement in the election process. "I'm gonna bring people in from the grassroots to take ownership of their elections process," he stated.
Kolodin also expressed his intention to pursue Florida-style election reforms: "I believe the voters should have the option to vote to reform our election system following the model of a state that we know works, which is Florida, where they vastly improve their elections."
If the lawsuit against Yavapai County regarding precinct voting is still ongoing when he takes office, Kolodin promised immediate action: "On day one in office, that lawsuit's getting dropped. I'm just dropping that lawsuit so that the people can have the election system that they know works."
He emphasized the need to clean up voter rolls across the state, pointing to Maricopa County's recent purge of nearly 250,000 invalid registrants as evidence of widespread problems. "If it's that bad in Maricopa County, which we only know because we finally got somebody good in there in that County Recorder's office, how bad do you think it is in a place like Pima County?"
Growing Bipartisan Concern Over Election Administration
Kolodin argued that election integrity isn't a partisan issue, suggesting that voters across the political spectrum are frustrated with the current system.
"I know a lot of Democrats in this state now are starting to express frustration with the way that our elections are. It's not just Republicans," he noted. "I just had coffee with a Democrat friend of mine the other day and he's getting real frustrated with Adrian Fontes too."
Kolodin concluded with a call for unity around election reform: "Arizonans are really tired of being divided—divided by race, divided by religion, divided by different political parties. They're really tired of it being neighbor against neighbor. And I think most people out there, if their side wins an election fairly or loses it fairly, then they can accept that. We just got to get our elections back where people can have that trust, and so we can end this division."
Rising Crime Across America Shocks Winn Tucson
In a subsequent segment with Betsy Smith, spokesperson for the National Police Association, the discussion shifted to a series of shocking violent crimes across the country.
Smith detailed three high-profile mass killings that had recently made national headlines:
A quadruple homicide at the Owl Bar in Anaconda, Montana, where a 45-year-old Army veteran with known mental health issues killed four people, including the 64-year-old bartender, before fleeing into the woods in his underwear
A quadruple murder in rural Tennessee, where Austin Drummond, recently released from prison after serving 12 years, allegedly killed a young couple, the woman's mother, and her 15-year-old brother, leaving only their baby daughter alive
A mass murder in Manhattan that claimed four lives, including a police officer
"These last three national level mass shootings... all mental health issues is what we know to be the case," Smith noted. "We have mental health issues. We also have just a real lack of regard for life."
She emphasized that these high-profile cases represent only a fraction of the violence occurring nationwide, highlighting unreported mass shootings in Los Angeles (2 dead, 6 wounded), Atlanta (47 shot, 5 killed), and Chicago (19 shot in a single weekend).
"The left will tell you that it's guns driving it, and that's just not the case," Smith argued, pointing to the fact that many of these shootings occur in cities with strict gun control laws.
Law Enforcement Challenges and New Crime Trends
Smith described a disturbing new robbery trend originating in Chicago but spreading nationwide. Rather than demanding cash, criminals are forcing victims to transfer money via payment apps like Venmo, Cash App, and Zelle.
"What they do is they sort of pile on them, grab them, they are armed, they point a gun to the head of the victim and then they demand their phone," she explained. "People don't carry cash anymore. I don't know about you, but I almost never have cash on me. And a lot of us pay for everything using our phones."
She advised listeners to be aware of their surroundings, especially in early morning hours when many of these robberies occur, and to comply if confronted since "no amount of money is worth your life."
Federal Corruption and Law Enforcement Integrity
The conversation concluded with a discussion of emerging revelations about federal corruption, including Cash Patel's discovery of a hidden room in the Hoover Building "full of documents and computer hard drives that no one had ever seen or heard of" that former FBI Director James Comey allegedly concealed.
Both Winn and Smith stressed the importance of accountability for those who abuse power, with Smith expressing concern about the lack of prosecutions for high-level corruption: "One of the biggest frustrations for people who voted for Donald Trump the first time was there were very few perp walks and prosecutions."
Winn emphasized that addressing corruption is essential to preserving America's founding principles as the nation approaches its 250th anniversary: "Those that are trying to destroy our country are trying to destroy what the founding fathers wanted to do. But if we go down, the world goes down, and there'll be nothing but evil dictators."
The discussion concluded with a call for civic engagement, particularly urging Tucson residents to vote in the upcoming city council election to address local issues like crime, infrastructure, and the fentanyl crisis.