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Week in Review: Reject the Leftist ‘Utopia’ Recipe for Ruin

November 5, 2022

Progressive policies are a recipe for economic ruin—look no further than the current state of leftist “utopias” like California and New York. But Arizona voters can protect themselves from devastating tax-and-spend schemes by voting “yes” on Prop 132, which requires a 60% affirmative vote before any tax increase can be approved at the ballot.

Two years ago, Arizonans saw how out-of-state special interests spent $25 million to impose the largest tax hike in the state’s history. The Goldwater Institute defeated that job-killing measure, Prop 208, but liberal special interests are still trying to buy their way onto our ballot. That’s why we need Prop 132—because there always ought to be a high bar for taking money out of taxpayers’ pockets. For more information on Prop 132, visit YesonProp132.com!

Here’s where the Goldwater Institute stands on other 2022 Arizona ballot measures:

Vote Yes

Prop 128 lets the Arizona Legislature amend ballot measures that the courts determine contain unconstitutional or illegal language.

Prop 129 ensures ballot measures apply to only a single subject.

Prop 309 requires voter ID for all forms of voting.

Vote No

Prop 209 would severely inhibit all lenders from collecting on debts.

Prop 211 would force private organizations that speak out on issues to publicly disclose their donors.

Prop 310 imposes a new $200 million sales tax increase on Arizonans.

Find out more at the Goldwater Institute’s 2022 Know Your Ballot page.  

Goldwater Goes to the Supreme Court—Again!

Defending liberty in state courts? ✔️

Federal courts? ✔️

The U.S. Supreme Court? ✔️

The Goldwater Institute is carrying on its legacy of successfully protecting constitutional rights in the nation’s highest court. It’s Goldwater’s third go-round at the Supreme Court, which only takes a fraction of the cases it’s asked to hear, and this time, Goldwater is standing up for at-risk Native American children’s rights.

As Goldwater Institute Vice President for Legal Affairs Timothy Sandefur writes in National Review, the Court will hear oral arguments Wednesday in a case challenging the constitutionality of the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA). The 1978 statute creates a unique set of race-based rules for foster care and adoption of Native children, making it harder for them to escape abuse or find loving adoptive homes. “Of course, having two different tests for kids of different races is literally the definition of ‘separate but equal,’” Sandefur notes.

The Goldwater Institute filed a brief urging the justices to strike down ICWA, and has done more work than any other group nationwide to challenge ICWA’s unjust and unconstitutional burdens.

Read about that work here, and read Sandefur’s op-ed at National Review.

Dodging Accountability in ‘The Zone’

What happens when government officials refuse to enforce the law in one of the nation’s largest homeless encampments? Unfortunately, the result is a surge in violent crime, streets littered with human waste, and the destruction of dozens of businesses in downtown Phoenix’s “The Zone.” City officials won’t address the crisis—part of a disturbing trend playing out in cities across the country—so the Goldwater Institute is supporting innocent property and business owners who have sued the city for maintaining this nuisance.

At a recent court hearing, one local business owner said he’s been forced to seal his building’s windows to keep out urine. But despite this shocking testimony, the city claims it’s making a policy decision to maintain The Zone. Law-abiding citizens’ only recourse, they say, is to vote them out. While the city tries to dodge accountability, the crisis keeps getting worse. Tent-dwelling transients are setting dozens of fires each night—just this week, flames overtook a section of The Zone, engulfing everything in their way.

The city’s inaction comes with a steep cost, and as Timothy Sandefur writes, “the burdens are being borne by innocent property owners in the neighborhood, who didn’t cause the homelessness problem and shouldn’t be deprived of their property as a consequence of what the city calls its ‘policy choices.’”

Read more at In Defense of Liberty

 

 

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