She’s not out printing up bumper stickers and buttons — at least not yet.
But Gov. Jan Brewer wants everyone to know that she believes she could legally seek another full four-year term in office in 2014 if that’s what she decides to do, regardless of the 1992 voter-approved constitutional amendment on term limits.
Her contention is based on a legal opinion crafted for her by Joe Kanefield when he was her chief legal counsel.
Kanefield, now an attorney in private practice, acknowledged the Arizona Constitution says statewide elected officials can serve only two consecutive terms. And it says that calculation “shall include any part of a term served.”
But Kanefield says the time Brewer spent finishing out Janet Napolitano’s term in 2009 and 2010 does not count toward her two-term limit. He said the clock started running when Brewer took office in January 2011 after winning the 2010 race.
“Several people have talked to me about that,” Brewer said Tuesday of a 2014 race. While the governor said she’s made no decision, “it’s very interesting the way that certain people interpret the law and the constitution, if you will.”
“I have been encouraged from people in the state and elsewhere, to at least consider it,” she said.
Brewer, who would be 70 in November 2014, said her refusal to tamp down speculation about another run is not a slap at other Republicans waiting in the wings, including state Treasurer Doug Ducey and Secretary of State Ken Bennett.
“What it says is that I’m the current sitting governor and I love my job and that I have made major reforms in the state of Arizona,” she said.
“Am I burned out? No. I love what I’m doing,” Brewer continued. “I think I could continue by making Arizona a better state in which to live. It’s just something that’s in my blood, I guess.”
Kanefield said he believes those who crafted the 1992 ballot measure put in the provision about part of a term counting toward a full term to keep politicians from “gaming” the system, resigning right before the end of their second term in a bid to remain in office.
And he said that rule should apply to someone who seeks and is appointed to fill out someone else’s term.
But Kanefield noted that Brewer was secretary of state in 2009 when Napolitano quit to take a job in the Obama administration. More to the point, he said already existing provisions of the Arizona Constitution made the succession automatic.
“That way we always have someone with the powers and authority of governor,” Kanefield said. And he said that should not be held against Brewer or anyone else in a similar position.
“It doesn’t make any sense to penalize the secretary of state who becomes governor because that person didn’t have a choice,” he said.
It will be up to Brewer to test that theory, as any effort to run in 2014 is virtually certain to provoke a legal fight. That would leave the final decision up to a majority of the five-member Arizona Supreme Court.
Three of the justices are Brewer appointees. But that likely means nothing, as the court has sided against Brewer in some past legal battles like her bid to fire the chair of the Independent Redistricting Commission.
The issue arose one other time since the 1992 vote: when Jane Hull became governor in 1997 after Fife Symington was convicted of criminal charges in federal court. But Hull, who won a term of her own in 1998, chose not to run again in 2002.
Symington’s criminal conviction was overturned by a federal appeals court. He was pardoned by outgoing President Bill Clinton before there could be another trial.
fix pinal posted at 8:07 pm on Mon, Nov 19, 2012.
Will the Arizona Supreme Court rule in favor of Brewer running for govenor again, only if it politicaly benefits the judicial system and the judges. Currently the Arizona State Bar and the Arizona Supreme Court Presiding Disciplinary Judge are exercising a strangle hold on the political system within the judiciary. William J. O'Neil, the Presiding Disciplinary Judge is running amuck and using the position to intimidate and control any attorney who would stand up against a judge. O'Neil though has his own ethical problems including allegations in a Judicial Complaint of short sale/mortgage fraud, influencing court proceedings, nepotism, falsifying public records to name a few. Read the complaint.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/112852009/William-J-O-Neil-Arizona-Presiding-Disciplinary-Judge-judicial-complaint
Now O'Neil has stacked the 3 member disciplinary panel by having his good friend and next door neighbor sit on at least 5 hearings. The close relationship was not disclosed to the defendents (attorneys).
http://www.scribd.com/doc/113542723/Oneil-Gallo-Conflict-With-Docs
This is a very serious ethical breach which the Supreme Court is doing nothing about. The day is here where an attorney representing you or me dare not question a judge for fear of retaliation by O'Neil and the Arizona State Bar. Fair representation is a thing of the past. God forbid anyone depends on justice if it is not in the best interest of the judiciary. It is past time to have Senate hearings on these matters as quite apparently the Judiciary is incapable of policing itself.
It is a great concern also that the media will not report on these issues, one Phoenix tv station was threatene with a libal/slander suit if the report prepared was run.
BassAckwards posted at 8:59 am on Thu, Nov 15, 2012.
I swear if Arizona re-elects this retarded loon again I give up. There is simply no hope for this place to be anything but a wasteland of knuckledragging moronic inbred idiots who destroy our educational system and spend all our money stopping crimes that don't happen or that are victimless and pretending to stop people from crossing the border when they still cross whenever they want, oh and trying to prove the President was born in Kenya. She isn't even originally from here!!! Stop electing outsiders with the expectation that they will give two donks about the state!
Ateam1 posted at 6:25 am on Thu, Nov 15, 2012.
Davidnichols: These p[eople are called MESTIZO'S. Definition of word is Mixture but it has nothing to do with being legal or not.If you LIBTARDS have your way this great nation of our's will no longer exist.We the people of LAWS will defeat you lawless renegades.GO JAN.
magenta posted at 8:49 pm on Wed, Nov 14, 2012.
Please no.
psyko tek posted at 6:03 pm on Wed, Nov 14, 2012.
AWWW, hell no
dtmac posted at 5:18 pm on Wed, Nov 14, 2012.
Well this will be decided by the AZ Supreme court, my hope is they say NO, NO, NO!
Regardless, I wouldn't vote for her.
Leon Ceniceros posted at 12:53 pm on Wed, Nov 14, 2012.
LOL....the Libs showing how dumb they are.......Mexican is not a Race.....Hispanic is not a Race....Latino is not a Race.............they are all ....Ethnicities.
If the Mexican, the Honduran, the El Salvadoran and the Guatamalan have 51% Spanish blood then they are as Caucasian as Sheriff Joe, and Governor Jan Brewer, Rush Limbaugh, Hannity and Bill O"Reilly.
Oh....an you might want to look up the "legal" definition for ......"immigrant".
Illegal Aliens are not "immigrants", they are "citizens of a foreign Country who have entered the United States = illegally (the did not come through a US Border Crossing".
Just like I told Mikey McClellan....look up facts, engage brain then and only then.....open mouth.
DavidNichols posted at 11:23 am on Wed, Nov 14, 2012.
Governor Brewer said: "We are a land of Laws, all Laws."
Only laws against Hispanic Immigrants and ignoring their Legal Citizen Children, and Families.
Just not the Laws Mrs. Brewer chooses to break or ignore!
Defrauding Social Security, ignoring State Constitution, and Term Limits Voters mandated, ect.
What a Racist Hypocrite.
az2008 posted at 8:20 am on Wed, Nov 14, 2012.
Leon, I wish a lot of Faux News watchers would share your admirably high standards.
Leon Ceniceros posted at 7:45 am on Wed, Nov 14, 2012.
HOW ABOUT SOME "FAIR AND BALANCED" REPORTING ???
IF I HAD WANTED TO READ A "COMMENTARY"....I WOULD HAVE READ THE "COMMENTARY" OR "OPINION" SECTION.
EVT REPORTERS..........LET'S LEAVE THE PERSONAL POLITICAL AGENDAS AT HOME WHERE THEY BELONG AND JUST GIVE THE READER THE FACTS FOR A CHANGE.
Deddzone posted at 7:21 am on Wed, Nov 14, 2012.
I'm not surprised the rightwing nuts are going to ignore another law. If they can't win they attempt to change the rules or not count the votes.
Jan is done. And the GOP would do well to find someone who speaks for the majority...not a screaming and shriking minority.
doc10250 posted at 6:55 am on Wed, Nov 14, 2012.
I thought the object of this election was to "de kookify" the state government and what did we do? We gave even more of a mandate to the bully with a badge, and now we're pondering changing the rules to put back just another in a long line of "kooks" in the governor's office? This sounds like a serious us problem. I just heard from Florida. We have overtaken even them in being the laughingstock of the nation. Keep it classy Arizona! HA.
downtownresident posted at 6:29 am on Wed, Nov 14, 2012.
Apparently, in Arizona, voters are only used as a means to an end, and their wishes/welfare is of no concern to elected officials, nor are the laws enacted to protect them from unethical, selfish politicians.
Bad enough we have a senile bigot as sheriff, but now Granny Jane wants to change the laws to suit her selfish thirst for power.