Arizona Legislative District Four is one of several battleground LDs that will determine which party runs both chambers of the Arizona State Legislature.
In the Senate, educator Christine Marsh is running for re-election.
In the House, former representative Kelli Butler, after a stint as a member of the Maricopa County Community College District Board, is looking to return to the legislature.
Accountant and Madison School Board President Karen Gresham is looking to win the other state house seat.
If elected, both will work toward:
- Fully funding public education.
- Reforming the out-of-control welfare program for the wealthy, the state’s private school voucher system.
- Making child care, housing, and health insurance more affordable.
- Protecting reproductive freedom.
- Enacting common sense gun safety and violence prevention measures.
Both Ms. Butler and Ms. Gresham graciously took the time to respond to questions about their campaigns for the State House.
The questions and their responses are below.
Please describe at least two reasons why your public policy goals as a state legislator will move. Arizona forward and lift Arizonans up.
Karen Gresham: “As Democrats, when we flip the legislature, that’ll be a top priority and we will choose to fully fund our public schools which of course has lots of good consequences for our state, economic and otherwise.”
Kelli Butler: “Republicans have been in charge of the legislature for decades and a lot of people feel left behind. I think a lot of Middle-Class Arizonans feel like the economy isn’t working for them. We will be much more focused on things like affordable, housing, affordable childcare, and affordable health insurance. Funding our Public Schools is so that they are providing the world-class education that our students deserve.
Karen Gresham: “Our school public schools were recently ranked 51st, so very, very bottom in the country and we can’t have that anymore and we need to change that. We have too many shortages of teachers and staff. Our class sizes are too large. We need to solve that.
Please describe at least two reasons why your opponent’s public policy goals as a state legislator will move Arizona backward and pull Arizonans down?
Kelli Butler: “Matt Gress and the majority party in the legislature have positioned Arizona to be 51st in the country in public education funding and that needs to change. We also have this budget deficit that we are now facing because of their tax policy and the out-of-control Voucher Program. We need to rein the voucher program in. We need to make sure that new revenues are all directed to areas where there’s the greatest return on investment like Education. And that’s what we will do.”
Karen Gresham: “We have two opponents but one has come in and has a record in the legislature so that’s what we kind of focus on. Not only are his positions on Reproductive Rights not aligned with the majority of Arizonans. We don’t want that. Most of his votes are with his party because they won’t get anything passed without every member voting yes, on something.”
“The other important issue for me is gun safety and gun violence prevention and his record on that is also in the wrong direction.
“The other opponent has also gone on record as being anti-reproductive freedom and anti-choice and has some very extreme views.”
Please comment on the current state of your ground game and voter turnout operations
Kelli Butler: LD Four has been working for months and months. Our volunteers are knocking on doors and have been identifying voters and understanding how people feel about issues. We have hundreds of volunteers who are ready to go out, especially after ballots drop to go back and talk to those voters who we know already support us and to continue to talk to Republicans and Independents who have not decided. It’s a matter of all of the huge waves of volunteers and supporters that we have in LD Four who know how important this race is and that’s how we’re going to win.”
Karen Gresham: “We have amazing volunteers and amazing support. We also make lots of phone calls during the week. Every week, we and the volunteers also knock on thousands of doors.”
Kelli Butler: “Our office is always full of people handwriting postcards and making sure that you know our names get in front of voters.”
Is there anything else you would like to convey to the readers about your campaigns for the Arizona State House? Please explain.
Karen Gresham: “The Republicans have had been in control of our legislature for 60 years and their turn is up. It’s not good for Democracy. It’s not good for our state. We just need to change things like funding our schools, protecting our Reproductive Rights, and enacting some commonsense gun safety legislation.”
Kelli Butler: Senator Christine Marsh, Karen Gresham, and I all grew up in LD Four. We raised our kids here and we got involved in politics because we saw the cuts to public education firsthand and we have all done as much as we could to try to fix that and add varying levels of involvement. We’ve all been very involved. Obviously, Christine Marsh is a teacher but we are inspired and motivated to fix our public schools to make sure that all of the students in Arizona are going to high-quality schools where students can thrive.
Karen Gresham: “I am also serving on the Madison School Board and am its current President. As Kelly said, I grew up here, but I also have an accounting degree. I’m a former CPA and the way our state budget is being, run right now, that needs to change as well.”
Please click here to see Ms. Butler’s campaign website.
Please click here to see Ms. Gresham’s campaign website.
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