Adrian Fontes, Arizona Secretary of State

Thursday, September 24, 2026 | 30:17

Incumbent Democratic Secretary of State Adrian Fontes believes that letting his Republican opponent, state Rep. Alexander Kolodin, win in November (becoming chief elections officer for Arizona) would be tantamount to handing the “keys of the kingdom to the weirdos.”   Fontes, my guest on this week’s AZ Political Podcast, says that Kolodin “doesn’t want to reform elections; he wants to upset the apple cart. He wants to force every Arizonan to stand in line to vote. He hates voting by mail.”   To back up his assertion, Fontes says that, during every session Kolodin has served in the Legislature, he’s “introduced legislation or supported legislation to kill voting by mail.    “This is a guy who authored Prop 144… that effectively erases your ability to vote by mail… [but] doesn’t exactly say that because he’s one of those sneaky lawyer types that’ll do that and he’s been known to misrepresent things.”    Fontes says that voters have lost confidence in our elections systems because of “people like Alex Kolodin lying about poll workers, lying about temporary workers in our warehouses, lying about our local elections officials” and he adds that attempts by Kolodin and others to prove election chicanery “haven’t ever proven anything.”    As far as the campaign trail goes, Fontes, who grew up in rural Nogales, Arizona, says he’s tried to hit as many parts of the state as he can during his reelection bid — visiting all of the state’s 15 counties before the primary. And it’s what he says he’ll keep doing through Election Day: visiting Arizona, end to end.    Although, I have my doubts as to whether Fontes will visit the spot I’ve asked every statewide candidate about: Littlefield, Arizona.    In all fairness, because Littlefield is located in the furthermost (northwestern) corner of the state; it’s small enough (population: 256) to be named “Tinyfield;” and you have to go through Nevada or Utah to access it by car (and his campaign can’t afford its own chopper); I didn’t make Fontes “campaign promise” to campaign there.