2025 Arizona Election Law Refresher

Eric H Spencer Related Seminars and Products

Partner

Snell & Wilmer LLP

Eric Spencer is a partner at Snell & Wilmer in Phoenix and primarily focuses his practice on election and political law. Eric most recently served as the State Election Director in the Arizona Secretary of State’s office from 2015-2018. Before his original stint at Snell & Wilmer from 2007-2014, Eric began his professional career as an infantry officer with the U.S. Army, where he achieved the rank of Captain following a 12-month tour of duty during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Among other awards and decorations, Eric was awarded the Bronze Star Medal and Combat Infantry Badge after having led nearly 250 combat missions and patrols in southeast Baghdad in 2006. Eric holds a master’s degree in public administration from Harvard University, law degree from Duke University, and bachelor’s degree in political science (magna cum laude) from UCLA.

Sarah Rae Gonski Related Seminars and Products

Sarah Gonski is an election law attorney and policy expert who advises political committees, think tanks, and advocacy organizations at every stage of the political process. She focuses on developing and implementing bipartisan policy solutions to render the election process more voter-friendly, accurate, and efficient. Her consulting clients include the Institute for Responsive Government, the Center for Secure and Modern Elections, the Center for DMV Election Resources, and more. She also teaches Election Law at Arizona State University's College of Law. Prior to her policy and teaching work, she spent seven years in private practice working to secure and expand access to the democratic process. In that capacity, she litigated over 100 election law and voting rights cases across the country in both state and federal courts, including the United States Supreme Court. In 2020, she litigated nearly a dozen lawsuits defending President Biden from those seeking to overturn the results of the presidential election. Sarah lives in Phoenix, Arizona, and is a graduate of the University of Maryland-College Park and Harvard Law School.

Adrian Paulino Fontes Related Seminars and Products

Of Counsel

Dessaules Law Group

is an Arizona native born and raised on the border in Nogales. His active duty service in the United States Marine Corps solidified his love of country and made him a strong advocate of the US Constitution. He took this passion back to finish his undergraduate degree with summa cum laude honors at Arizona State University, and then to the University of Denver where he received his Juris Doctorate. After law school, Mr. Fontes worked for the Denver DA's Office prior to returning to Arizona to continue his prosecuting career with the Maricopa County Attorney and then the Arizona Attorney General. With the Arizona AG, he headed the Foreign Prosecution Unit in the Fraud and Public Corruption Section of that office. Mr. Fontes left government service for private practice where he made his way from working in local Justice Courts, through Superior Courts and eventually to several cases before the US Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit. Adrian Fontes lives in Phoenix with his wife Mona and their three daughters. He is an avid musician, college football fan and supporter of his community. Adrian Fontes is a member of the National Association of Counties Telecommunications and Technology Policy Steering Committee and is working on the requirements to achieve a Certified Elections/Registration Administrator (CERA) designation. CERA is the elections profession's highest designation. Adrian Fontes serves as the 29th Recorder and is the first Latino to serve as a countywide elected official in Maricopa County, Arizona.

James E Barton II Related Seminars and Products

Partner

Barton Mendez Soto PLLC

practices political and government relations law at Barton Mendez Soto PLLC. He has defended many statewide ballot measure campaigns against challenges to their place on the ballot and constitutionality. He has also challenged and defended candidate petition the constitutionality of state laws regulating elections and campaign finance. Jim represented the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission, the Citizens Clean Elections Commission and the Arizona Secretary of State as an Assistant Attorney General in the Arizona Solicitor General's Office. In that capacity, he also litigated election law cases, including Arizona Free Enterprise v. Bennett, for which he served as counsel of record before the United States Supreme Court. After receiving his Juris Doctor, magna cum laude, from the Arizona State University College of Law in 2005, Jim clerked for Arizona Chief Justice Ruth McGregor. He earned a Bachelor of Arts in physics and philosophy at Northwestern University and served as a submarine warfare officer in the United States Navy from 1993 to 1998.

Daniel Abraham Arellano Related Seminars and Products

Partner

Herrera Arellano LLP

Kara Karlson Related Seminars and Products

Kara Karlson is an Assistant Attorney General who represents the Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission, and other state agencies in election matters at trial and on appeal. Her practice covers a wide variety of election law disputes, including constitutional and Voting Rights Act litigation in federal and state courts, state-law based election challenges, petition challenges for candidates and initiatives, campaign finance complaints, and recount litigation. Additionally, she advises other state agencies and serves as lead litigation counsel for those agencies in high-impact litigation. Before coming to the Attorney General’s office, Kara worked at a boutique law firm in the Phoenix area which focused primarily on bankruptcy litigation and general civil litigation. She is admitted to practice in Arizona state and federal courts as well as the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and the United States Supreme Court. Kara is very involved in the Arizona Women Lawyers Association, serving on the Steering Committee, as a co-chair to the Mother’s Forum, and the Leadership Appointments Committee. She also serves as Chair on the Developmental Disability Advisory Council, providing advice to the Division of Developmental Disabilities on how to provide the best services for approximately 46,000 Arizonans with developmental disabilities. Prior to becoming a lawyer, she worked on staff for political committees in the 2004 and 2006 election cycles. Kara is an Arizona Pioneer Descendant, with family roots in Arizona that stretch back to 1900. She married her junior high sweetheart, and they are blessed with two wonderful daughters.

David Andrew Gaona Related Seminars and Products

ANDY GAONA is a partner at Coppersmith Brockelman PLC, and focuses his practice in the areas of election and political law, public law, commercial litigation, appeals, and public records. He advises candidates, PACs, party organizations, nonprofits, and public bodies on issues of campaign finance, ballot access, and election-related litigation. In addition, Andy works closely with groups that sponsor or oppose ballot measures at both the state and local level from the drafting of ballot language to defending and prosecuting pre- and post-election challenges (and everything in between). Andy also litigates commercial, civil rights, public law, and public records matters for a diverse group of clients. He has been recognized as a Super Lawyers® “Rising Star” in business litigation since 2014, and by Best Lawyers® in the appellate practice since 2020 and in the commercial litigation practice since 2022. He was named one of Phoenix’s “40 Under 40” by the Phoenix Business Journal in 2022, and has been recognized by the Arizona Capitol Times as Arizona’s top political lawyer for the past two years, Andy serves on the Board of Directors of the Arizona Center for Law in the Public Interest and also works on pro bono legal matters when possible. When he is not working, he is trying to keep up with his two ridiculously-cute daughters.

Karen J Hartman-Tellez Related Seminars and Products

Senior Litigation Counsel

Office of Arizona Attorney General

KAREN J. HARTMAN-TELLEZ is Senior Counsel in the Civil Division of the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office. She has practiced law in Arizona for more than twenty years in the areas of civil litigation involving constitutional, education, employment, civil rights, media, and political law issues. For the last fifteen years, a substantial portion of her practice has focused on representation of state and county election officials, litigating matters at all levels of state and federal courts. Earlier in her career, she spent several years in private practice, where her practice focused on media, constitutional, voting rights, and federal Indian law. In 2008, she spearheaded the Arizona Election Protection program, a non-partisan voter assistance program. Karen graduated magna cum laude from the College of Law at Arizona State University. After obtaining her law degree, she completed a judicial clerkship with the Honorable Ruth V. McGregor, Vice Chief Justice of the Arizona Supreme Court.

Alexis Elizabeth Danneman Related Seminars and Products

Lisa Marra Related Seminars and Products

Andrew W Gould Related Seminars and Products

was appointed to the Arizona Supreme Court in 2017 after serving 5 years on Division One of the Arizona Court of Appeals. Prior to his appointment to the Court of Appeals, Justice Gould spent 11 years as a Judge of the Superior Court in Yuma County, where he served as both Associate Presiding Judge and Presiding Judge. He received his J.D. from Northwestern University School of Law in 1990. He began his legal career in Phoenix, Arizona, practicing in the field of civil litigation. In 1994, he became a Deputy County Attorney, prosecuting major criminal cases for Yuma and Maricopa Counties. He served as Chief Civil Deputy for the Yuma County Attorney’s Office from 1999-2001. Justice Gould has previously served on the Arizona Supreme Court Commission on Technology, as the President of the Arizona Judges’ Association, and has taught at the Judicial Conference and New Judge Orientations. Justice Gould currently sits as the Chair on the Committee on Judicial Ethics and Training and as a member of the Glendale Judicial Selection Board. (10/2017)

Rhonda L Barnes Related Seminars and Products

is general counsel and deputy chief of staff to the Democratic caucus in the state house of representatives. She began working there in the fall of 2011 and currently staffs the house elections committee and the house rules committee, primarily focusing on election legislation and the constitutionality of pending legislation. From 2005 to 2011, Rhonda was a litigation associate at the law firm Perkins Coie, where she worked on numerous election matters, including candidate nomination petition challenges, initiative drafting and litigation, advising political parties and numerous candidates, in addition to general civil litigation involving public records, civil rights and Indian law. Rhonda clerked for Justice Rebecca Berch on the Arizona Supreme Court after graduating from the Arizona State University College of Law in 2004. She obtained her undergraduate degree from the University of Arizona in 1998.

Amy Bell Chan Related Seminars and Products

Amy B. Chan has served as General Counsel for the Secretary’s Office since March 2022. In over two decades as a lawyer, she has served as a legislative staffer, Director of Administrative Actions for Department of Real Estate, General Counsel for Department of Corrections, Administrative Law Judge for the Corporation Commission, and State Election Director under former Secretary of State Ken Bennett. In 2017 she was appointed to a five year term on the Clean Elections Commission by then-Senate Minority Leader Katie Hobbs, where she remains in that role as a holdover. From late 2013 through February 2022 she took time to raise her growing family and is pleased to have the opportunity to once again serve the Secretary and the people of Arizona.

Joshua Michael Whitaker Related Seminars and Products

Luke Albert Douglas Related Seminars and Products

Tracy Alice Olson Related Seminars and Products

TRACY A. OLSON has been a member of the State Bar of Arizona since 2018. She received her Bachelor of Business Administration in Accounting from Southern Methodist University in 2014 and her Juris Doctor, magna cum laude from the Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law at Arizona State University in 2017. Following law school, Tracy clerked for Justice Clint Bolick on the Arizona Supreme Court. Currently, Tracy is a senior associate attorney at Snell & Wilmer focusing her practice in special litigation and compliance. She represents businesses and individuals in constitutional, government relations and regulatory matters. Her state and federal constitution and government relations practice includes compliance consulting and trial and appellate litigation related to election law, political law and commercial litigation.

Rebecca Layne Related Seminars and Products

Rebecca Layne is a senior associate with Holtzman Vogel, focusing her practice on tax-exempt organizations, nonprofit and corporate governance, election law, tax strategy, and litigation.

Prior to joining the firm, Rebecca was a Senior Attorney with the Internal Revenue Service in the Office of Chief Counsel where she litigated numerous cases in the United States Tax Court and advised on a wide range of tax matters. Prior to her time at the IRS, she was an Honors Trial Attorney for the United States Department of Justice in the Tax Division, where she litigated dozens of cases throughout the Southeastern United States. She began her career as a law clerk to the Honorable Kathleen Kerrigan at the United States Tax Court.

State Bar of Arizona - Southern Regional Office