Arpaio Recall Effort Out Of Money, Will Push On; Or, Is It Related To Threat Of Legal Action?

The Recall Arpaio committee, formally titled "Respect Arizona", announced today that they were out of money and switching to all-volunteer efforts (rather than hybrid paid-and-volunteer).  The news was broken by Phoenix New Times' columnist Stephen Lemons Channel 12's Brahm Resnik, and expanded upon by the Republic's Laurie Roberts.  However, one paid petition circulator has informed Arizona's Politics that the reason given was the impending threatened lawsuit against the recall proponents; that report has not yet been confirmed.

It seems surprising that the announcement comes so soon after they gleefully claimed that they were more than one-third of the way to the 335,000+ valid signatures they need to place the Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio back on the ballot.  That press conference and the attention it received surely would have resulted in money flowing in, and earlier pledges of money being turned into cash.

Tomorrow is supposed to be the day that the Citizens To Protect Fair Election Results - the committee opposing the recall - has promised to file legal action against the recall committee for allegedly violating the Arizona Constitution.

(corrected at 3:07pm to reflect New Times being first to break story)





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