While the rest of the country was turning a darker shade of blue, a funny thing happened in Arizona: Republicans gained ground in the state legislature.

It wasn’t supposed to work out that way. The Democrats set out this year to take control of the Arizona House of Representatives. To do that, they needed to hang onto all the gains they made in 2006 and flip four seats.

The political climate could hardly have been more hospitable to Democrats. Besides the damage that the Republican Party brand has suffered in recent years, the Democrats were flush with cash, while the GOP was pretty much broke.

So the Democrats recruited some sharp candidates and spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to boost their slate. But on Election Day, they ended up losing nearly all of the races they targeted.

Down here in Southern Arizona, they weren’t able to win an upset in Legislative District 30, which includes Tucson’s east side and Green Valley. They weren’t able to gain a seat in District 26 on the northwest side. And they weren’t even able to beat Republican David Stevens in Marana’s District 25, even though Stevens wasn’t even in the country to campaign.

I’m sure there are plenty of reasons that Republicans were able to pick up seats in the House of Representatives yesterday, but here’s a major one: Clean Elections, the program that hands out public dollars to anyone who wants to run for office.

Many of the conservative Republicans who prevailed might not have even been in the race—or at least survived their primaries—if they hadn’t been funded with public dollars. It’s kind of funny that these budget hawks have finally found a constituency that they don’t mind handing out welfare to: Themselves.

But I have a sneaking suspicion that helping conservative Republicans pick off moderates in primaries and knock out Democrats in general elections was not the aim of the founders of the Clean Elections system. I guess Arizona’s latest tilt to the right is just what we call an unintended consequence of government reform.

With virtually all of the early ballots processed, it appears that 226,568 people voted before Election Day. Most were by mail, but 18,320 people visited polling booths that were set up in the weeks before the election.

The Elections Division reports that 152,091 voters cast a ballot on Election Day, which brings Pima County’s total number of voters to 378,659.

That just leaves the provisional ballots. Pima County Registrar of Voters Chris Roads says that if 20,000 of those turn out to be valid, then we’ll have had about 400,000 voters cast a ballot in the election, which comes out to about 80 percent of 498,777 eligible voters. That’s a few points below the 82 percent turnout we had in 2004, but in raw numbers, it exceeds the 369,321 people who voted in the last presidential year.

We’ll crunch the final numbers when we get them, but at this point, it looks like nearly 60 percent of the voters cast early ballots in the election.

We’ll be bringing you our ongoing analysis of what those numbers mean over the next few days.

Rep. Phil Lopes, a Democrat from District 27, will have a leadership position.

Lopes is a voice of moderation and cooperation and is a valuable member of the Legislature.

Yesterday’s Arizona Capitol Times, reporting on the Democrats electing a new leadership team:

David Lujan is the new minority leader. His seatmate, Kyrsten Sinema, was elected assistant leader and Chad Campbell was named whip. All three represent central Phoenix districts, and they ran as a team for caucus leadership.

Lujan said his goal is to build coalitions with Republicans to craft policies that are grounded in solving the state’s problems, not advancing the political agendas of either party.

In choosing Lujan and his teammates, the caucus voted resoundingly against Phil Lopes, who had led House Democrats since 2005. He was teaming with Steve Gallardo, who was looking to move from whip to assistant leader, and Lynn Pancrazi, who was running for whip.

However, Lopes was defeated early in the caucus elections, as he came in last in a three-way race that also included David Bradley of Tucson. Because neither Bradley nor Lujan captured the support of the majority of the caucus on the first vote, they went head to head in a second round of voting.

Lujan said he won that contest by “a number of votes.”

With 99.1 percent of precincts reporting, according to the Arizona Secretary of State’s Office, here are the latest results.

The payday-loan industry suffered a stunning defeat after 59.5 percent of voters rejected Proposition 200, the Payday Loan Reform Act. Prop 200, which was funded with more than $14 million from the payday-loan industry, would have allowed the industry to continue to operate in the state past 2010, the year in which the law that allowed them to set up shop will expire.

Business owners did not get a break from voters after the stunning defeat of Proposition 202. The Stop Illegal Hiring Act, supported by a variety of business interests, would have granted Arizona companies additional defenses if caught with illegal workers on their payroll. However, with the defeat—59.1 percent of voters were saying no—the state’s employer-sanctions law, said by many to be the toughest in the nation, will remain on the books.

Voters also ensured that they will still be able to increase taxes at the ballot box by overwhelmingly rejecting Proposition 105, aka Majority Rules, which would have required that any statewide initiative that hiked taxes or fees be approved by a majority of all registered voters, not just the ones who cast ballots in the election. A whopping 65.7 percent of voters rejected the measure.

Tucson Mayor Bob Walkup, a vocal opponent of Prop 105, expressed satisfaction at the measure’s defeat.

“Prop 105 was designed to not allow any proposition to pass,” he said.

Gay marriage became even more illegal in Arizona after 56.5 percent of the voters supported Proposition 102, which will amend the Arizona Constitution to limit marriage to being between only one man and one woman. Arizonans rejected a broader law that would have also banned civil unions and domestic partnerships by a narrow margin two years ago.

Beth Walkup, the wife of the mayor, and many other Southern Arizona politicos spoke out against the anti-gay-marriage measure, to no avail.

“She campaigned on the basis that voters already said no,” Walkup said about his wife’s efforts against Prop 102.

Outgoing Senate President Tim Bee, who put what would become Prop 102 before the state Senate in the waning hours of this year’s legislative session after waffling on the matter for months, defended the initiative.

“I was told by my constituents that it was their No. 1 issue that they wanted me to address, and I did. I brought it up for them. … Clearly, it’s different from what was brought up two years ago (and that’s why it passed).”

State lawmakers will continue to be a bargain for taxpayers after 64.5 percent of voters rejected Proposition 300, which would have increased annual legislative salaries from $24,000 to $30,000.

Proposition 101, aka the Freedom of Choice in Health Care Act, remained too close to call as of Wednesday morning, when voters were rejecting it by just more than 2,100 votes. If it were to make up the difference and somehow pass, Prop 101 would amend the state Constitution to ban the state from interfering with health-insurance options.

Arizonans will never be required to pay a sales tax on the purchase of a home after voters resoundingly approved Proposition 100, aka Protect Our Homes, which was placed on the ballot by the Arizona Association of Realtors to block the state from charging a real-estate transfer tax, a revenue mechanism in some states. Some 76.9 percent of voters added this amendment to the state Constitution.

However, buyers of new homes will not be getting a longer guarantee on their houses after 77.9 percent of voters rejected Proposition 201. Homebuilders successfully argued that the proposition would increase lawsuits and raise home prices.

Voters in the Tucson Unified School District were fairly split on the idea of allowing the district to raise property taxes to spend more money on programs—but Wednesday morning, Proposition 403 appeared to be headed for defeat. With 97.2 percent of TUSD precincts reporting, Prop 403 had 48.36 percent of the vote (66,797 votes), while no had 51.64 percent (71,337 votes).

Also close but apparently winding up in the “win” column was Prop 401, which will create new dietary and care restrictions for dogs within the city limits of South Tucson. The South Tucson Dog Protection Initiative was aimed at improving the lives of dogs that race at Tucson Greyhound Park; yes had 402 votes, and no had 373 with all South Tucson precincts counted.

This report was prepared by Jimmy Boegle, Mari Herreras and Jim Nintzel, with additional reporting from Claire Conrad, Megan Neighbor and Hank Stephenson.

(Photo of Victoria Ochoa and Manuel Sanchez reacting to the Obama win by Kelly Rashka)

“I’m absolutely thrilled,” said Jennifer Powers-Murphy, who worked phone banks for the freshman Democrat. “The solar thing is a really big deal to me. The only thing John McCain has ever said about solar is that we should all wear sunscreen and a hat.”

Hundreds of Democrats, packed into a ballroom at the Marriott University Park, had been in a feverish mood all evening as state after state was called for Illinois Sen. Barack Obama.

“Hallelujah goes right there,” said an ebullient Anita Smith-Etheridge as NBC News called Ohio for Barack Obama. “It’s way cool.”

Paul Eckerstrom, a former chair of the Pima County Democratic Party, said “this could be a realignment election.” But, he added, “Obama and the Democrats have to govern in a practical way.”

At the Manning House, where local Republicans gathered, the crowd was much more subdued.

The party started at 7 p.m. with just a handful of GOPers milling about and looking at the widescreen TV set tuned to Fox. Only a few politicians wandered around shaking hands, including Tucson Mayor Bob Walkup, Congressional District 8 candidate Tim Bee, and defeated Legislative District 27 Senate candidate Bob Westerman.

As the evening progressed, another look around the room revealed the presence of perennial CD 7 candidate/total loon Joe Sweeney, standing against the wall alone and drinking a tall glass of orange juice.

Eventually, Marilyn Zerull (who would go on to finish third in the LD 26 House race), Juan Ciscomani (defeated in the LD 29 House race) and Jonathan Paton (the Senator-elect from LD 30) joined the party.

During John McCain’s concession speech from Phoenix, which started about 9:20 p.m.–20 minutes after national news organizations deemed Barack Obama the president-elect–the room was silent and still, with occasional shouts blaming the liberal press (including some participants walking toward the press area to give the assembled reporters a good stare-down) and a whisper from losing LD 27 House candidate J.D. Duke Schechter to a fellow Republican that tomorrow, the “flag flies at half-mast.”

“We may not be in power, but our day will come again,” said Pima County Supervisor Ray Carroll, who ran unopposed.

The closest thing to excitement at the GOP gathering came during Bee’s speech—which was neither a concession speech nor a victory address. Bee stood before the room with his family and thanked his supporters.

“On behalf of the Bee family, who has also given a tremendous amount of support, we’re hoping and praying for a victory,” Bee said, walking to his wife and giving her a hug.

The only other moment of significant applause came when results of Proposition 102, which will put a ban on gay marriage in the Arizona Constitution, were being announced.

However, the news for Republicans was otherwise bleak. To nobody’s surprise, Sweeney said he plans to run for Congress again in two years in an effort to, in his words, get those “pachucos out of South Tucson.”

Back at the Marriott, a packed house celebrated as Giffords took the stage and started addressing the exited gathering—but was forced to stop speaking when President-elect Obama started giving his victory speech. Numerous tears of joy were spilled as Obama spoke in Chicago.

Giffords echoed Obama’s “change” theme in her remarks.

“Two years ago, Southern Arizona said to Washington: Change can’t wait,” she said, referring to her election to Congress two years ago. “Tonight, the rest of America said they can’t wait for change, either.”

She praised Obama as a leader who can bring the fractured country together.

“Generations will look back on tonight, and they will thank you,” she told the crowd. “They will thank you for your audacity and support.”

While Giffords at first did not declare victory over Bee, just before 11 p.m., she said she’d be heading to Washington, D.C., for a second term. However, Bee refused to concede—even though he was losing, with 42.2 percent of the vote to Giffords’ 55.3 percent, at 11 p.m. (Wednesday morning, with 98.6 percents of precincts reporting, Bee was still down, 54.7 percent to 42.9 percent.)

With Democrat Harry Mitchell headed to re-election in District 5, and Democrat Ann Kirkpatrick headed to victory over Republican Sydney Hay, Democrats took an apparent a five-seat majority in the eight-person congressional delegation. Democrats Raúl Grijalva and Ed Pastor won re-election, as did Republicans John Shadegg and Jeff Flake.

Many legislative races remained too close to call late Tuesday night, but cleared up Wednesday morning. In the hotly contested Legislative District 26 Senate contest, Republican Al Melvin led Democrat Cheryl Cage by less than 300 votes, but with many ballots left to count. However, by Wednesday morning, Melvin had emerged the apparent victor, by 1,127 votes.

In the House race in District 26, Democrat Nancy Young Wright emerged the apparent victor Wednesday morning, with 25.9 percent of the vote. Republican Vic Williams also had 25.9 percent (but 50 fewer votes) to nab the second seat. Republican Marilyn Zerull (25.2 percent) and Democrat Don Jorgensen (23 percent) were defeated.

“I’m feeling cautiously optimistic,” said Williams Tuesday night.

In the District 30 House race, Republicans Frank Antenori and David Gowan beat Democrat Andrea Dalessandro, whose underdog bid enjoyed substantial financial support from the Arizona Democratic Party’s surrogates.

At the Manning House, Antenori went off on one of his trademark rants when asked for comment.

“We are going to get this budget done in 65 days. We are going to push hard for that,” he said. “We are not going to muck things or muddle things up until we get this budget done.

“It’s kind of funny that the governor and her union thugs came after me with everything they had, and they still couldn’t beat me. I was outspent 8-to-1. They took things out of my Political Courage Test, which, by the way, Ms. Dalessandro … didn’t take, so she’s a coward. They were basing that off of two boxes that I did not check. Therefore, they implied that I would cut off a woman diagnosed with cancer from health-care access, which is such bullshit. There’s no other word to describe it than bullshit.”

Republican Rep. Jonathan Paton easily dispatched Democratic challenger Georgette Valle to advance to the District 30 Senate seat being vacated by Bee.

Democrats were hoping to pick up a House seat in Legislative District 25 after the retirement of Republican Jennifer Burns, but that didn’t happen. Democrat Pat Fleming led with 28.7 percent of the vote Wednesday morning (with 99.1 percent of precincts reporting), with Republican David Stevens (25.7 percent) in second place. Democrat Richard Boyer was in third with 24.4 percent, and Timathy Davies was bringing up the rear with 21.2 percent.

Democrat Manny Alvarez narrowly won his Senate bid against Republican Mary Ann Black.

Democrats Matt Heinz and Daniel Patterson were handily defeating Republicans Pat Kilburn and Juan Ciscomani in the District 29 House race, while Democrat Linda Lopez was unopposed in her Senate bid.

Democrats Phil Lopes and Olivia Cajero-Bedford were dominating the District 27 House race, while Jorge Luis Garcia was thumping Republican Bob Westerman in the Senate race by a 2-to-1 margin.

In the only contested race for the Pima County Board of Supervisors, Democratic incumbent Sharon Bronson was defeating Republican Barney Brenner with 59 percent of the vote.

Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik was easily dispatching his GOP opponent, Harry Shaw, with 64.6 percent of the vote.

Pima County Attorney Barbara LaWall, who had 53.1 percent of the vote, was heading to victory over Republican Brad Roach and Green Claudia Ellquist.

In the extremely tight statewide race for three Arizona Corporation Commission seats, Democrats Paul Newman and Sandra Kennedy (both 18.1 percent) were leading with more than 99 percent of precincts reporting. Republican Bob Stump (16.2 percent) was edging Democrat Sam George (16.2 percent) for third place by just more than 1,300 votes (out of more than 4.6 million counted so far), followed by Republicans Barry Wong (15.7 percent) and Marian McClure (15.5 percent).

This report was prepared by Jimmy Boegle, Mari Herreras and Jim Nintzel, with additional reporting from Claire Conrad, Megan Neighbor and Hank Stephenson.

Observations:

– Wow, Corp Commission is close, as are the LD26 and LD30 races.

– Pima County Elections is being extremely slow, as expected.

– “Majority Rules,” Payday Loan industry and legislators’ raises going down in flames. TUSD budget override in big trouble.
Here are the latest results from Arizona races:

President of the United States of America (Arizona) — 85.0 percent reporting

Barack Obama (D): 788,440 (44.8 percent)

John McCain (R): 952,138 (54.1 percent)

Congressional District 8 — 56.5 percent reporting

Gabrielle Giffords (D): 120,071 (55.3 percent)

Tim Bee (R): 91,674 (42.2 percent)

Congressional District 7–78.2 percent reporting

*Raul Grijalva (D): 87,849 (63.1 percent)

Joe Sweeney (R): 45,922 (33.0 percent)

Legislative District 25–77.1 percent reporting

House

Pat Fleming (D): 23,012 (28.4 percent)

Richard Boyer (D): 19,546 (24.1 percent)

David Stevens (R): 21,097 (26.1 percent)

Timathy Davies (R): 17,296 (21.4 percent)

Legislative District 26–38.9 percent reporting

Senate

Cheryl Cage (D): 29,624 (50.0 percent)

Al Melvin (R): 29,643 (50.0 percent)

House

Nancy Young Wright (D): 28,650 (26.2 percent)

Don Jorgensen (D): 25,612 (23.4 percent)

Vic Williams (R): 27,809 (25.4 percent)

Marilyn Zerull (R): 27,284 (24.9 percent)

Legislative District 27-71.0 percent reporting

Senate

Jorge Luis Garcia (D): 25,801 (66.9 percent)

Bob Westerman (R): 12,793 (33.1 percent)

House

Phil Lopes (D): 22,378 (34.8 percent)

Olivia Cajero Bedford (D): 23,742 (36.9 percent)

Kent Solberg (G): 3,212 (5 percent)

J.D. Schechter (R): 10,627 (16.5 percent)

Legislative District 29 – 55.9 percent reporting

House

Matt Heinz (D): 16,207 (33.5 percent)

Daniel Patterson (D): 16,785 (34.6 percent)

Pat Kilburn (R): 8,568 (17.7 percent)

Juan Ciscomani (R): 6,889 (14.2 percent)

Legislative District 30-53.9 percent reporting

Senate

Georgette Valle (D): 29,759 (41.1 percent)

Jonathan Paton (R): 42,597 (58.9 percent)

House

Andrea Dalessandro (D): 33,985 (31.7 percent)

Frank Antenori (R): 36,015 (33.6 percent)

David Gowan (R): 37,147 (34.7 percent)

Arizona Corporation Commission — 91.1 percent reporting

Paul Newman (D): 813,587 (18.1 percent)

Sandra Kennedy (D): 814,338 (18.1 percent)

Sam George (D): 729,561 (16.2 percent)

Barry Wong (R): 711,332 (15.8 percent)

Bob Stump (R): 733,814 (16.3 percent)

Marian McClure (R): 701,722 (15.6 percent)

Pima County Supervisor District 3–44.8 percent reporting + early votes

Sharon Bronson (D): 22,814 (59.4 percent)

Barney Brenner (R): 15,547 (40.5 percent)

Pima County Attorney–52.5 percent reporting + early ballots

Barbara LaWall (D): 125,136 (54.5 percent)

Brad Roach (R): 89,903 (39.2 percent)

Claudia Ellquist (G): 14,270 (6.2 percent)

Pima County Sheriff–52.5 percent + early ballots

Clarence Dupnik (D): 153,061 (66.1 percent)

Harry Shaw (R): 78,008 (33.7 percent)

Proposition 100 - Protect Our Homes — 90.7 percent reporting

Yes: 1,304,426 (77.0 percent)

No: 389,500 (23.0 percent)

Proposition 101 – Freedom of Choice in Health Care Act — 90.7 percent reporting

Yes: 830,731 (49.9 percent)

No: 833,019 (50.1 percent)

Proposition 102 – Marriage — 90.7 percent reporting

Yes: 998,429 (56.4 percent)

No: 771,350 (43.6 percent)

Proposition 105 – Majority Rules — 90.7 percent reporting

Yes: 571,500 (34.2 percent)

No: 1,099,766 (65.8 percent)

Proposition 200 – Payday Loan Reform Act — 90.9 percent reporting

Yes: 682,579 (40.5 percent)

No: 1,003,577 (59.5 percent)

Proposition 201 – Homeowners’ Bill of Rights–90.9 percent reporting

Yes: 368,716 (21.9 percent)

No: 1,311,630 (78.1 percent)

Proposition 202 – Stop Illegal Hiring –90.9 percent reporting

Yes: 696,029 (40.7 percent)

No: 1,012,343 (59.3 percent)

Proposition 300 – State Legislators Salaries — 91.1 percent reporting

Yes: 608,899 (35.5 percent)

No: 1,106,689 (64.5 percent)

Proposition 401 – South Tucson Dog Protection Initiative –50 percent + early votes

Yes: 235 (56.4 percent)

No: 182 (43.7 percent)

Proposition 403 – TUSD Budget Override–67 percent + early votes

Yes: 55,961 (47.7 percent)

No: 61,437 (52.3 percent)

Pima County election results

State of Arizona election results

If you’re staying in tonight, you can tune into KUAT Channel 6 for a special one-hour election edition of Arizona Illustrated at 10 p.m. Skinny scribe Jim Nintzel will be joining Arizona Illustrated anchor Bill Buckmaster, political pollster Margaret Kenski and UA political scientists William Dixon and John Garcia to chew on the results.

If you’re eager to get out to celebrate our nation’s historic election night, here’s where you can find some fun:

You’ll find the Democrats hanging out at the Marriott University Park, 880 E. Second St.

The Republicans will be hanging out at the Manning House, 450 W. Paseo Redondo.

The parties start around 7 p.m., and we’re expecting the first local election results–from early ballots–sometime around 8 p.m.

Meanwhile, all the cool kids will be down at Hotel Congress, 311 E. Congress St., where they’ll really be putting the party back into politics with updates on the results across the country, live bands and even a balloon drop. We know where we’ll be for last call.

We’ve done some research and come up with the following Battleground Districts to watch across the state as election results come in.

Legislative District 26

Democrats
Nancy Young Wright
Don Jorgensen

Republicans
Vic Williams
Marilyn Zerull

Legislative District 30

Democrat
Andrea Dalessandro

Republicans
Frank Antenori
David Gowan

Legislative District 9

Democrats
Shawn Hutchinson
Sheri Van Horsen

Republicans
Debbie Lesko
Rick Murphy

Legislative District 10

Democrats
Lamont Lovejoy
Jackie Thrasher

Republicans
Doug Quelland
Jim Weiers

Legislative District 11

Democrat Eric Meyer

Republican Jon Altmann
Republican Adam Driggs

Legislative District 12

Democrats
Eve Nuñez
David Scanlon

Republicans
Steve Montenegro
Jerry Weiers

Legislative District 20

Democrat
Rae Waters

Republicans
Jeff Dial
John McComish

Legislative District 21

Democrat
Phil Hettmansperger

Republicans
Warde Nichols
Steve Yarbrough

Legislative District 23

Democrats
Ernest Bustamante
Barbara McGuire

Republicans
John Fillmore
Frank Pratt

Legislative District 24

Democrats
Lynne Pancrazi
Theresa Ulmer

Republican
Russ Jones

Legislative District 25

Democrats
Richard Boyer
Pat Fleming

Republicans
David Stevens
Timathy Davies

A long-shot district for a Democratic pickup:

Legislative District 6
Republicans
Carl Seel
Sam Crump

Democrat
Teri Conrad
Jack Doody