Guests - Scot Mussi, J.C. Sheppard, Alex Kolodin

Arizona Legislative Session Update: Budget Battles, Border Security, and Election Integrity

Katie Hobbs' Governorship and Legislative Challenges

The Arizona legislature continues to wrestle with budget negotiations as the state approaches the fiscal year deadline. Scott Mussi, President of the Arizona Free Enterprise Club, describes the current session as "year three of the Katie Hobbs experience," characterizing her governorship as "bumbling" through many respects.

"Sometimes it feels almost not even real, like it's a pretend governorship," Mussi notes. "It's amazing how quickly she can bungle things up as she moves along."

According to Mussi, the Republican leadership in both the House and Senate must step up to put together a budget, as Hobbs has not been responsive to negotiation attempts. "Unfortunately, it doesn't seem as if a lot of substantive discussions have occurred between leadership in the House and the Senate and the governor on putting together a budget," he says. "We're into May now...and it's likely we're going to be here likely until the end of the fiscal year, at least close to it, which happens on June 30th."

Mussi believes a key issue is the crisis surrounding developmentally disabled programs that was "pretty much entirely created by Katie Hobbs." He explains that several years ago, the federal government under President Biden implemented a temporary COVID-19 program to help disabled children and parents. When federal funding dried up, most states phased out their programs. Although Arizona's legislature and Governor Hobbs agreed last year that there would not be ongoing state funding for the program, Hobbs never ended it.

"She just kept the toggle switch on," Mussi says. "And so you fast forward to January of this year, and she comes back and says, 'Oh, we're about $200 million in funding our entire program, and we're going to run out of money in April.'"

Though the legislature passed a stopgap measure with some reforms, the program will need to be revisited in June and could potentially "grow in size over the next several years, costing the state hundreds of millions of dollars."

Trump's First 100 Days: Border Security and Arizona Impact

President Trump's first 100 days in office have shown significant positive impacts on Arizona, particularly regarding border security. According to Mussi, border crossings are now at a historic low, demonstrating that the problem wasn't a lack of presidential authority.

"Trump came in and he solved the problem," Mussi states. "And now we have border crossings that are at a historic low. You go out and talk to people in border communities, and they are experiencing something that they have not seen in their lifetimes—the amount of calm, the things getting cleaned up. It's just been incredible."

Representative Alex Kolodin echoes this sentiment, noting that illegal border crossings are "way down" based on reports from law enforcement. He sees this as addressing the root cause of many issues the legislature tries to treat—sometimes in ways that are "very harmful to our civil liberties or very counterproductive."

Another key executive order signed by Trump last week instructs the Department of Justice to enforce federal laws preventing special benefits or subsidies for illegal immigrants, including tuition subsidies. Mussi explains that a ballot initiative in Arizona passed a few years ago allowing for taxpayer-subsidized tuition for illegal immigrants, but the program violates federal law.

"The law is clear," he says. "It states that no US citizen can pay more for tuition to any public university than a non-US citizen." When Arizona provides subsidized tuition for illegal immigrants while charging US citizens from other states higher tuition, it violates federal law. Trump has instructed his Department of Justice to address this issue.

The Fentanyl Crisis: Testing Solutions and China's Role

JC Sheppard, founder of Fentanyl Test, is working with the Trump administration and RFK Jr. at HHS to provide effective fentanyl testing solutions. He believes China has been actively involved in flooding the United States with fentanyl.

"China was actually giving tax breaks to companies that were infiltrating the United States on several different levels, and not just with chemicals to make fentanyl," Sheppard says. He believes the tariffs implemented by the Trump administration are making a significant difference in stemming the flow.

Sheppard explains that fentanyl is coming across not just the Mexican and Canadian borders, but "every single place they can get it in." He points to the fentanyl crisis as a product of both an open border and China flooding the country with the drug, causing the life expectancy in the United States to drop by approximately 2.5 years due to younger individuals dying from fentanyl.

His company produces two types of tests: a urine test for probation officers and parents, and a harm reduction test that doesn't require diluting substances in water—making it more likely to be used by drug users. The test is designed to detect fentanyl down to one nanogram, which Sheppard describes as "the only non-lethal cutoff in the world in terms of sensitivity."

Sheppard is working with Bobby Kennedy at HHS, Sarah Carter (who has been nominated to head the Office of National Drug Control Policy), and the Trump administration to get these tests implemented nationwide. He believes that with proper implementation, "within two years, you would see a decline of almost 90% in deaths."

Election Integrity and Secretary of State Race

Representative Alex Kolodin, who has announced his candidacy for Secretary of State against incumbent Adrian Fontes, discusses multiple election integrity concerns facing Arizona. He criticizes Fontes for his handling of voter rolls and implementation of controversial policies.

"Right before the election, he announced that there were hundreds of thousands of voters on the rolls who had never provided documented proof of citizenship," Kolodin says of Fontes. "And of course, if he had been halfway diligent in doing his job as Secretary of State, that wouldn't have just gotten released right before the general election."

Kolodin also points to Fontes' Elections Procedures Manual, which he claims violates the First Amendment by suggesting that conservative social media posts or Trump rallies that can be heard from inside a polling place constitute crimes. "This is just a guy who has no respect for the rule of law," Kolodin states. "And he has absolute disdain for the voters. I mean, if you come to him with a concern, he will mock you."

A significant concern raised during the discussion is the implementation of ballot drop boxes in Pima County. Kolodin argues these are not legally authorized, as the Secretary of State cannot go "way beyond the scope of his delegated authority by the legislature" to authorize drop boxes. Joel Strabala, an LD17 chair who called into the program, mentioned that Pima County has purchased four ballot drop boxes to be placed throughout the area.

Another issue is the potential shift to a single-envelope system for mail-in ballots, which would expose voter information—including political party affiliation—to anyone handling the envelope. Kolodin believes this undermines election security and transparency, which he says is the foundation of his campaign.

"You cannot have trust in our election system without having transparency in the election system," he emphasizes.

The Axon Controversy in Scottsdale

A significant controversy discussed involves Axon's attempt to build what would be the largest apartment complex in Arizona in Scottsdale. The company sought and obtained legislative approval to override a referendum that Scottsdale citizens were supposed to vote on, effectively cancelling an already-called election.

Colliden, who represents Scottsdale's LD3, strongly opposed this move. "Once an election has been called, we don't cancel it in this country. It's just not what we do," he states. He believes the bill violates the Arizona Constitution's special legislation provision, which prevents bills that do favors for just one company.

"The framers of the Arizona Constitution were very, very skeptical of the power of large corporations," Kolodin explains. "And they wrote in a lot of safeguards in the Constitution to make sure that they weren't just coming down to the legislature and getting whatever they wanted at the expense of the people."

He hopes the city of Scottsdale will sue over the issue soon, noting that with election law, "the quicker the better" because delays could lead to dismissal under the concept of laches.

Kolodin also reveals that Axon was "going around and saying, 'Hey, you know, guys, this situation is really telling us that we have to pay more attention to local politics.' And it was going around taking members out to $300 steak dinners." He interprets this as a clear signal that "these guys are going to contribute big money to political races if you're on their team."

Legislative Politics and Bill Battles

After announcing his candidacy for Secretary of State, Kolodin found that some of his bills were being blocked despite previously having unanimous support. He mentions two specific bills: an election bill to ensure candidates weren't getting unfair advantages based on last name spelling or gubernatorial voting patterns, and a bill to allow people to provide basic first aid without a medical license.

Both bills passed the House unanimously but were killed in the Senate after Kolodin announced his Secretary of State run. "It's very, very sad to see that there are people who vote on the person and not the bill," he says. "You'd like to think that politics isn't so petty because there's real people that these bills affect."

The medical freedom bill would have addressed a significant public health issue by allowing good Samaritans to provide basic assistance to people in need, including the homeless population. Under current law, even giving a child aspirin or applying a bandage to an open wound could technically be considered illegal.

Kolodin attributes these political dynamics to the influence of money and special interests in the legislature. "The MAGA stuff that gets run through the state legislature, it's really window dressing. And sometimes it's actually window dressing that's meant to do favors for the corporate cronies, but is dressed up to look MAGA," he explains. "And meanwhile, the real bills down there are the ones that move the money for the interests that have the money."

His solution is to "send better people down, people whose character you know," emphasizing that character is more important than stated beliefs in determining whether legislators will "give in to the lure of money once they're down at the Capitol."