Democrats eye a rural swing district in bid to flip the Arizona House

The path to Democrats taking control of the Arizona House of Representatives for the first time in 60 years runs through a rural blue legislative district that spans four counties where Republicans have managed to hold a seat for four years.

That makes Legislative District 23, which spans four counties and stretches from Goodyear in Maricopa County to Yuma, a crucial battleground for Democrats.

The district leans Democratic — Democrats hold a seven-point registration edge — but Republicans have nonetheless won one of its two House seats in the past two elections. 

Rep. Michele Peña, a Republican who hails from Yuma, shares the district with Rep. Mariana Sandoval, a Democrat who lives in Goodyear. She surprised most observers in 2022 when she edged out one of the two Democrats by 3,000 votes, and again when she won reelection in 2024, though by a narrower 2,179 vote margin. 

Democrats are hoping 2026 is the year they take control of both seats in the district.

During a Wednesday night Clean Elections debate that featured Sandoval and fellow Democrat Emilia Cortez, but that Peña skipped, the Democrats made their case to voters.  Sandoval said the Republican majority has prevented Democrats from advancing their policy priorities at the state legislature and said flipping control of the legislature is key to ensuring Democrats have a chance to make a difference.  

“When Democrats are in the majority, we can deliver an Arizona where working families come first, not corporations,” she said.  

In recent years, Arizona Democrats have sought to upend Republican control of the state legislature, which has been in place since 1966, with no success. But with President Donald Trump facing record-low public approval ratings and polls showing voters overwhelmingly favoring Democratic over Republican candidates, the party is optimistic that this year will prove different. 

On Wednesday, Sandoval and Cortez, a political newcomer from Yuma who has experience in tribal government, outlined their policy priorities, appealing to voters’ top concerns when they both cited affordability as the No. 1 issue they would tackle at the legislature if elected in November. 

The pair spoke about immigration enforcement, water conservation and local control. And while they mostly agreed on each topic, the one place they differed was whether they would vote in favor of water restrictions for everyday Arizonans. The district they are aiming to represent includes Yuma, the state’s agricultural core. 

Sandoval noted that Goodyear, along with many other cities, has a 100-year water designated assured water supply and said it’s too soon to consider constraining how much water Arizonans use. Instead, she advocated for educational efforts that encourage conservation. 

“At this point, I think we just need to be focusing on education rather than imposing (restrictions),” she said. 

Cortez, meanwhile, waffled over the question, but didn’t rule out supporting legislation that limits residential water use. 

“I don’t believe it’s a yes or no,” she said. “There’s practical ways of utilizing water.” 

The pair did, however, vocally support the move from Gov. Katie Hobbs and Attorney General Kris Mayes to cancel the state land leases from a company that dumped California’s sewage in Yuma. They both said they would oppose a move to renew those leases in their district. 

“We are not California’s dumping ground for bio solids,” Sandoval said. 

“Having someone else’s biosolids getting dumped in your backyard was kind of rough to accept, so that’s not something I would want to move forward in having in our community,” Cortez echoed.

The Democrats also weighed in on how cooperative local law enforcement officials should be with federal agents amid Trump’s violent mass deportation campaign. The legislative district sits on the border and it has a voting population that is 54% Hispanic. Sandoval and Cortez both said they disagreed with the violent tactics that have become common in immigration enforcement arrests, but Cortez appeared to stumble over a basic understanding of the difference between state and federal law enforcement agencies. 

When asked whether a sheriff’s deputy should hand over a person detained for aggravated assault to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement if that person is suspected of being undocumented, Cortez replied that, because sheriffs are federal, they should. 

“A sheriff is federal, so they would have the responsibility of putting them through,” she said.  

Sandoval quickly corrected that mistake, noting that sheriffs are county officials, and said that she doesn’t believe local law enforcement should turn over people to federal agents because of the risk of civil rights violations occurring. 

“We need to rebuild trust in law enforcement before we can start saying, ‘Yeah, he committed XYZ crime, (he should be turned over),’” she said. 

In her closing comments, Sandoval called on voters to elect her and Cortez to represent the district, saying that doing so was crucial to win a Democratic majority that could help the party enact policies that have long stagnated in the GOP-controlled legislature. 

“We need change, and that change starts with making sure that LD23 has strong voices at the Capitol,” she said.