Arizona Court Allows Independent Governor Candidate Hugh Lytle to Stay on Ballot After Legal Challenges

No Labels Candidate Survives Suit Over Business Address, Signature Count

A Maricopa businessman has survived multiple legal challenges that threatened to remove him from the Arizona gubernatorial ballot, clearing the path for an independent candidate to compete against Gov. Katie Hobbs and the Republican nominee.

Hugh Lytle, running under the No Labels Party banner, emerged from two separate lawsuits aimed at disqualifying his candidacy. One challenged his decision to list a business address on his nomination petition instead of his residential address. The other sought to strike him from the ballot due to insufficient signatures.

Judge Michael Mandell ruled in favor of Lytle on the address issue, determining that although he should have included his residential address, he did not substantially mislead voters.

"No evidence in the record suggests that signers were confused about who was seeking nomination or about whether he had met the residency requirements for Governor," Mandell wrote in his decision.

The case has now moved to the Arizona Supreme Court for a final ruling on the appeal filed by elector Craig Beckman.

Lytle also faced a challenge from gubernatorial candidate Teri Hourihan over signature validity. She claimed 4,748 of the 6,013 signatures on her petition should be invalidated due to invalid signatures and the use of petition circulators with felony convictions.

Judge Mandell rejected Hourihan's claims, stating she could not prove that the alleged felons had criminal records severe enough to discount the signatures collected.

"Lots of people are arrested for many different things," Mandell said. "It doesn't mean they were convicted of a felony."

Lytle entered the race in January as a health care executive and reported raising over $36,000 in individual contributions during his first campaign finance report. He also contributed $1 million of his own funds to the campaign.

"I've got a lot of interest and a lot of support in the community, but … I'm not someone who feels right asking people for contributions if I'm not officially on the ballot," Lytle said.

Hourihan is close to $6,000 in debt after raising about $17,772 in the first quarter, though $17,500 came from her own pocket and she spent $26,105.

For comparison, Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs brought in over $2 million in donations in quarter one. Republican Congressman Andy Biggs raised around $855,000 during the first few months of the year.

Lytle and Hourihan will face off in the No Labels primary on July 21. The winner will take on Hobbs and the winner of the Republican gubernatorial primary.

"The way it should be," Lytle said. "We should be competitive and not have parties blocking people out and doing maneuvers and using courts and so forth to discourage what is an already big task and hard thing to step in and lead and do."

The legal challenges to Lytle's candidacy came from Democratic attorneys working at Herrera Arellano LLP and Coppersmith Brockelman law firm. Austin Yost, Sambo Dul, and Kelleen Mull filed challenges against Lytle, with Dul previously working for Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs.

Paul Weich, a Tempe Democrat active in state politics, filed a separate challenge against Jessie Martines, a No Labels candidate for Congress in Congressional District 8.

Paul Johnson, chair of the No Labels Party in Arizona, accused Arizona Democrats of engaging in a coordinated campaign to remove third-party challengers over concerns they could siphon votes away from Democrats and hand electoral victories to Republicans in November.

"The idea that they challenged Hugh Lytle and the Green Party — that's the smoking gun," Johnson said.

Weich denied coordinating with the Democratic Party, though he acknowledged that Democratic attorneys filed the majority of the challenges.

"Weich also pointed out that it wasn't just Democrats looking into third-party candidates and the validity of their petitions," according to court records.

"Weich obtained public records showing Republican CD1 candidate Jay Feely's campaign also requested copies of petition signatures turned in by Christopher Ajluni and Monica Alponte, a Libertarian candidate," according to the source.

When Johnson first rebranded the No Labels Party as the Arizona Independent Party, it lowered the barrier to entry for candidates. Congressional candidate Christopher Ajluni, for instance, would have had to collect over 5,000 signatures to run without a party. But as a member of No Labels, he only needed 231.

Johnson acknowledged that some third-party candidates may have simply failed to follow the law.

"The idea that candidates mess up, make mistakes, those things happen and challenges happen," Johnson said. "But you can see a coordinated effort by the Democratic Party against independents, and it's just one more time they've done it."

Lytle's statement to the press echoed Johnson's criticism of Hobbs, citing the governor's connections to Yost and Dul.

"Governor Hobbs would rather hide behind high priced lawyers than face real competition at the ballot box. What is she afraid of?" Lytle said in a statement.

Michael Beyer, a spokesman for Hobbs' campaign, declined to comment.

Lytle maintains the party should be able to call itself whatever it wants. The Arizona Republican and Democratic Parties successfully sued to force his party, the Arizona Independent Party, to change its name back to the No Labels Party.

"My candidacy is not defined by a label or party name, it's ironically, No Labels," Lytle said.

Lytle is a Scottsdale businessman who has lived in Arizona for 29 years. He entered the race in January as a health care executive and said he is ready to focus on the road ahead now that he will officially appear on the ballot.

"We feel like common sense prevailed," Lytle said of the legal challenges to his candidacy. "We've had to take a lot of daggers to get here, and we're finally here. So now I'm ready to get going and compete."