You have to wonder what exactly Beth Ford did wrong.
Her five terms as Pima County treasurer have been marked by … not much at all, at least not much news or scandal.
That’s a good thing when you are responsible for handling lots of public money — collecting the tax revenue for the county and all the jurisdictions within it, as well as holding and dispersing the money like a bank.
This year, though, Ford, who is a certified public accountant, faced a strong challenge from Brian Bickel, a longtime Democratic Party activist and former hospital executive. As the votes stood Wednesday evening, Bickel held a small lead of 2,795 votes, or a 0.6 percentage point margin — a good position but not conclusive.
Looking back over her last term, Ford didn’t do much wrong, but Bickel did make some criticisms about the office’s transparency and operations. Mostly, she’s a Republican in a county that has grown increasingly hostile to GOP candidates.
“I think it’s a straight line thing in Pima County,” Ford said Wednesday. “If anybody bothered to look at me, I was by far the more qualified candidate.”
But she was in the wrong party as many Pima County voters started by voting against Trump at the top of the ballot and kept filling the Democratic ovals all the way down.
Increasingly in Pima County, it appears that even moderate Republican candidates with technical skills will have a hard time getting elected.
Among all the county races, the only contested one won by a Republican so far has been incumbent Pima County Supervisor Steve Christy’s apparently narrow victory over Democratic challenger Steve Diamond.
As of Wednesday evening, Christy had a 6,949-vote lead over Diamond, a margin of almost 6 percentage points, about 53% to 47% .
But Steve Spain, the Republican heir apparent to District 1 supervisor Ally Miller, was losing by 4,364 votes, or 2.6 percentage points, to Democrat Rex Scott.
Benny White, a Republican with deep elections experience, lost handily to new Democratic candidate Gabriella Cázares-Kelly in the race for Pima County recorder. The margin so far is more than 18 percentage points.
Election employees processing and verifying ballots at the Pima County Election Center in Tucson on Nov. 4, 2020. (Josh Galemore / Arizona Dai…
And Sheriff Mark Napier, a Republican pragmatist who has appealed to independents and Democrats in the past, was losing by 10,838 votes, or 2.4 percentage points, to Democratic former sheriff Chris Nanos.
Even performing and campaigning as a relative moderate is no protection for Pima County Republicans anymore.
“It’s very discouraging for me as a party leader to see this overwhelming defeat at the county level,” said Pima County GOP Chair David Eppihimer. “We put a lot into it. We thought we had superior candidates.”
“The county is blue and turning bluer, as people move in from other areas.”
The latest count shows the county has 256,582 registered Democrats, or about 40%of the total voter count, 636,093. There are 186,057 registered Republicans in the county, making up about 29% of the total. And 187,112, another 29% , have not declared a party.
While Republicans chalk up their increasing defeats to voter-registration disadvantages, some Democrats pointed to their own ground work and the opportunity handed them by the president.
Pima County Democratic Party Chair Alison Jones gives quite a bit of credit to Trump.
“We heard from many people who said, ‘Because of Trump I’m voting straight Democratic. I’ve never done that before, I’ve never considered that a priority, but this time I am.’ ”
As a local party, Pima County Democrats also worked hard to reach infrequent voters, Jones said, and that appeared to pay dividends as independents broke hard for the Dems.
The party failed in its efforts beyond the county boundaries though. Pima County Democrats worked hard to get their candidates elected in Legislative District 11, which stretches from Oro Valley, across Pinal County to the town of Maricopa.
They targeted Sen. Vince Leach and Rep. Mark Finchem, both Republicans. So did outside groups who poured in $247,000 against Finchem and $285,000 for his Democratic opponent Felipe Perez.
But the Republicans there had enough support outside Pima County to pull off victories, though the margins are narrowing from election to election.
