Even by political standards, some Arizona Democrats are showing a remarkable level of political dexterity, as they publicly campaign for the State House to pass the budget that was recently passed out of the State Senate. The only wrinkle is that for many of them, it was a budget they voted against, and attacked during the process as bad policy and irresponsible governance.
Even the Democrat Minority Leader in the State Senate, Priya Sundareshan, got caught playing both sides. In a Friday afternoon post on X, the official account of the Senate Democrats printed a statement from her calling for the House to pass the Senate’s budget, but that post earned a quick response from Republican State Representative Nick Kupper, who asked “Are you talking about the same budget that you just voted NO on 15 times on Thursday/Friday? Maybe you should have voted yes if you wanted this crap budget passed.”
.@priya4az are you talking about the same budget that you just voted NO on 15 times on Thursday/Friday?
Maybe you should have voted yes if you wanted this crap budget passed. https://t.co/U9hC79wLGz pic.twitter.com/wUiaVYqbop
— Nick Kupper (@realnickkupper) June 21, 2025
Others piled on, earning the sarcastic wrath of Sundareshan, who responded to Kupper and another State Representative “Aww I’m sorry you don’t know how to be a leader.”
Capital observers have remarked on the budget process and how awkward it was for both parties to be divided on the budget that was negotiated by Senate President Warren Peterson and Governor Katie Hobbs. In one notable example, some Republicans were arguing to lower tuition at state colleges and universities, an issue that ordinarily would be expected to garner a great deal of support from the Democrat Senators, but because it was not part of the negotiated budget, many Democrats voted against lower tuition, putting them directly at odds with college students, an important part of their electoral base.
“It was basically bizarro world,” said one lobbyist who was watching the budget debate online, “so you had Democrat Senators voting against their own Governor on issues that used to be Democratic issues while Republicans were standing up and championing them.” She noted that given the events of the last week, she wasn’t surprised to see many of those same Democrat no votes now campaigning for the budget to pass the House. “I mean really, what could be a more perfect ending to this process than that?”
