Connerly initiative fails to make ballot

By Evan Brown, PolitickerAZ.com Reporter

The Arizona Secretary of State's office ruled Thursday that the Arizona Civil Rights Initiative does not have enough valid signatures to qualify for the ballot. Over 100,000 were rejected for reasons such as missing or inaccurate information from signers, or signers who aren't registered voters in the state.

The initiative, which is in the mold of several other initiatives nationwide that would in effect destroy affirmative action at the states' colleges and universities, collected over 330,000 signatures, nearly 100,000 above the necessary number. However, after the secretary of state deemed 40 percent invalid, lowering it below the threshold of about 240,000 signatures.

Protect Arizona's Freedoms, a group opposed to the Civil Rights Initiative and let by state Rep. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Phoenix), was quick to applaud the decision, and once again rip into Ward Connerly, the businessman, former University of California regent and anti-affirmative action activist who authored the initiative.

"“We’re not surprised,” said Sinema in a statement from PAF. “We’ve highlighted time and again the illegal and deceptive signature-gathering tactics used by Connerly’s organization and the Georgia National Ballot Access firm to force the initiative on Arizona and other states. Those tactics resulted in stinging defeats in Missouri and Oklahoma, pending lawsuits in Colorado and Nebraska, and an even more stinging defeat for Connerly today in Arizona - once designated ‘ground zero’ by Connerly in his Super Tuesday plan to do away with equal opportunity programs in five states simultaneously.”

PAF filed its own complaint to get the initiative kicked off the ballot, alleging it had found evidence that as many as 100,000 signatures could be invalid due to "deceptive practices" in gathering them.

Max McPhail, executive director of the Arizona Civil Rights Initiative, has long said that any improper actions on the part of signature gatherers were isolated incidents, and that problems with paid signature collecters were widespread among several initiatives seeking the ballot this November.

McPhail told PolitickerAZ.com his organization is going to pursue reinstating signatures, particularly in Maricopa County.

"Other initiatives have found a 15 to 18 percent error rate in Maricopa County," said McPhail. He said he thought the county had been overwhelmed by the signature counting process - "which is understandable," he added.

"We're going to take a look at our signatures, and we're confident we'll find a significant number have been invalidated that were valid," he said.

Evan Brown is a PolitickerAZ.com Reporter and can be reached via email at noreply@politicker.com.

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