Mutually assured dysfunction

Democrats tearing down Democrats ... It's not even 2026 yet … And is anyone in charge here?

Arizona Democrats spent the weekend with their mouths agape at state Democratic Party Chairman Robert Branscomb’s no-holds-barred letter accusing both of Arizona’s U.S. senators and various other bigwigs in the party of bullying, intimidating and threatening him as they attempt to sabotage his leadership.

Then it got wilder as all of Arizona’s top elected Democrats — including Kelly and Ruben Gallego, Gov. Katie Hobbs, Secretary of State Adrian Fontes and Attorney General Kris Mayes — shot back with their own letter accusing Branscomb of lying about them and hinting that he should resign.

At least one U.S. senator is now threatening not to help the party fundraise.

All this inner-party squabbling is fantastic political drama — and it actually matters because whoever leads the party will determine how competently it heads into 2026, when Hobbs, Fontes and Mayes¹ will be up for reelection (or whatever it is they decide to run for).

If the party chair can’t work with the candidates and party unity further erodes, it’ll be every candidate for themselves next November.

But before we get to the dueling Democratic hate letters and struggle for control of the party, a couple of bullet points of backstory are in order.

• Branscomb is the new guy. Democratic state committeemen elected him to lead the party in January following Democrats’ crushing defeat nationwide last year.

• He beat incumbent Yolanda Bejarano for the job, even though Bejarano had the backing of all the people listed above: Kelly, Gallego, Hobbs, Fontes and Mayes.²

• Branscomb was able to topple the incumbent and upset the power brokers because Bejarano’s tenure was marred by allegations that party treasurer Rick McGuire had been “self-dealing” by paying his own company for work. She backed him wholeheartedly.

• Branscomb campaigned on a promise to clean up the party and do a full audit.

• The election wasn’t even particularly close — Branscomb won roughly 60% of the vote.

Branscomb’s victory had to be embarrassing for the elected leaders who supported Bejarano, particularly Kelly, who has been actively attempting to concentrate his power and build his “machine” within the Democratic Party — with Bejarano serving as an important cog in that machine.³

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Ok, with that backstory in mind, you’re ready to dive into the letters that had our phones blowing up all Saturday morning.

It starts off normal enough, with Branscomb promising a “candid update” on his first 90 days on the job, which he notes was marked by some “unexpected challenges,” including the previous staff cleaning out the party headquarters of computers, furniture, critical staffers and everything else he would need to do the job.

“What should have been a professional handoff of responsibilities instead became a scramble to uncover critical information,” Branscomb wrote. “I reached out to the outgoing Executive Director, but was met with resistance and, in some cases, outright obstruction. … Instead of facilitating a smooth transition, the outgoing leadership withheld banking information, stonewalled my efforts, and discouraged current staff from staying on, even offering to help them find other jobs.”

But it wasn’t just the outgoing staff giving him a hard time. When Branscomb fired the former executive director, he got an angry call from Kelly, who “strongly discouraged me from making staffing changes without consulting him.”

“He emphasized his role in raising funds for the party and implied that I should be grateful, even beholden, to him for the party's financial resources. I found this sentiment troubling, as it undermined the independent leadership you elected me to bring,” Branscomb wrote.

Branscomb writes that he struggled to hire a new executive director after that, until he finally settled on an internal hire, promoting “seasoned party veteran” Michael Ruff to the job. Within minutes of telling party insiders, Branscomb’s phone was blowing up from Arizona’s senators.

“I received a text from one of our U.S. Senators stating he would no longer support or participate in state party fundraising. Shortly after, the other Senator called me directly -demeaning me and demanding I reverse my decision within 24 hours or ‘face consequences,’” Branscomb writes.

Afterwards, a senior Kelly staffer told people that the election of Branscomb, who is Black, was the result of “Black folks coming after Latinos,” Branscomb writes. He urged Kelly to fire the unnamed staffer for the “deeply irresponsible” and “dangerous” rhetoric.

“The idea that both Arizona Senators would withdraw support because I did not choose their preferred candidate is not only troubling - it's a threat to the integrity and independence of our party. I will not be coerced, and I will not be silenced,” the defiant Branscomb concluded.

Within hours of Branscomb firing off his nuclear letter, Kelly, Gallego, Hobbs, Fontes and Mayes had all signed onto their own short letter calling him a liar — though they didn’t specifically say what he was lying about — and calling his outburst an example of the kind of “bad-faith response we’ve come to expect of the new leadership.”

Meanwhile, Branscomb has no plans of resigning, he tells 12News’ Brahm Resnik, who notes it would take a two-thirds vote from the state committeemen to remove him.

We expect more drama on the horizon, as the dust settles on this weekend’s Democratic war of words.

All that Democratic drama got us thinking: Who do you like among Arizona’s top Democrats and why? Who do you trust? Who do you respect? Who do you think is a scoundrel?

A few comment prompts to get the conversation started:

• Generally, how do you feel about the job that Gov. Katie Hobbs is doing? What has she done a good job on and where’s she failing?

• Same for Kris Mayes? Do you think she’s doing a better job of representing your interests than Hobbs or worse?

• And Adrian Fontes? What’s your read on him?

• Finally, what do you make of Arizona’s two U.S. senators? What do you wish they were doing differently?

Today’s discussion thread is open to all subscribers. But it’s our paid subscribers who keep the Agenda in business. Upgrade to a paid subscription today to invest in local journalism.

Hank will be up early⁴ to manage the discussion thread, answer your questions and bullshit about politics in general.

Drop us a comment!

1. CORRECTION: A previous version of this email listed Kelly as among those up for reelection next year. He’s up in 2028.

2. Fun backstory on that backstory: Two years earlier, in 2023, Hobbs had backed Maricopa County Supervisor Steve Gallardo to be the state party chair over Bejarano, sparking what we called “the first big fight” of her governorship — between her and the rest of the Democratic Party power structure. We wrote about that “proxy battle for the future of the party” at the time, noting that “By going all-in in a divided and contentious party chair race, Hobbs is setting herself up for a big victory that would focus the party squarely in her corner or a big defeat that could set the party leadership against her. We’ll find out Saturday which it is.” It was the latter: Berajano won that race with about 70% of the vote. Two years later, Hobbs joined the losing team and backed Bejarano for reelection.

3. There’s kind of a weird power struggle among Arizona’s top five Democrats over who will run the party “machine” — basically, the infrastructure, manpower and system of patronage. The basic dynamics, as we see them, are: Kelly mostly controls it even though nobody particularly likes him; Hobbs wants to control it but nobody has much faith in her; Mayes doesn’t have much interest in controlling it but people would rather see her in charge; Fontes thinks he’ll control it someday; and Gallego will eventually end up with it.

4. We’ll hop on the comments at like 7 a.m. ish.