Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Gregory Como ruled on Wednesday that Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes improperly approved a name change for a new political party. The No Labels party launched in 2023, and Fontes allowed the party to change its name to the Arizona Independent Party last October.
Both the Arizona Republican Party and the Arizona Democratic Party filed lawsuits, as well as the Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission, contending the name change would cause confusion since voters who don’t choose a party are known as independents.
Como said in his ruling, “By approving a party’s requested name change, without it obtaining the necessary signatures for party recognition, the Secretary permits a political bait and switch. A party can gather signatures using an innocuous sounding name and then change it to something completely different.”
He explained, “When a person signs a petition on behalf of an aspiring party, it is reasonable to infer that they are largely motivated by how the party describes itself, i.e., the party’s name. Would the same 41,000 people who signed petitions to recognize the No Labels Party have signed to support the ‘Arizona Nazi Party’ or the ‘Arizona Anarchists’?
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