OPINION — Scottsdale Councilman Barry Graham has endorsed Alexander Kolodin for Arizona Secretary of State. Voters should look past the campaign shorthand and at what that endorsement and Graham's own record actually say.
Kolodin was local counsel in the "Kraken" lawsuit attempting to overturn Arizona's 2020 results, work that got him admonished and placed on probation by the state bar. He represented then-GOP Chair Kelli Ward as she fought a congressional subpoena tied to the Jan. 6 investigation. He didn't assault a police officer that day, but it does make him someone who spent years using his law license to resist the accountability process that followed it. With his endorsement, Graham has said, to me, Jan. 6 was OK; beating up police is OK.
Graham is also in danger of being seen as pro-defund the police. Graham twice voted against sending Prop 490 — the measure funding preserve management — to Scottsdale voters and urged residents to reject it. Prop 490 now funds the preserve's Police Ranger Unit and a fire department technical rescue team. Opposing it twice, whatever the stated reason, meant opposing the funding stream for that public-safety staffing.
