Arizona 2020 Election Results

Arizona held its general election on November 3, 2020, deciding 90 legislative seats across 60 districts and the office of Corporation Commissioner. No chamber changed party control.

Highlights

• Republicans kept both legislative majorities in what was seen as Democrats' best statehouse target, preserving the GOP trifecta. Voters delivered progressive wins through ballot measures instead, legalizing marijuana and taxing high earners for schools.
• Democrats needed to gain two House seats and three Senate seats for majorities they had not held since the early 1990s. They came up short in both chambers:
  • In the Senate, Christine Marsh (D), the 2016 Arizona Teacher of the Year, unseated Sen. Kate Brophy McGee (R) in Senate District 28 by about 500 votes, two years after narrowly losing to her. It was Democrats' only Senate gain.
  • In the House, each party flipped one seat, leaving the split unchanged. Judy Schwiebert (D) took a seat in two-member District 20, ousting Rep. Anthony Kern (R), while Joel John (R) won a seat in District 4, defeating Rep. Geraldine Peten (D).
  • With Brophy McGee defeated and Sen. Heather Carter beaten in her primary, moderate Republicans were out, and both chambers' GOP caucuses were more conservative than before.
• On the Corporation Commission, which regulates utilities and was weighing a 100% carbon-free standard, all three seats on the ballot had been held by Republicans. Anna Tovar (D) won one, finishing first and joining Democrat Sandra Kennedy on the commission, while Commissioner Lea Marquez Peterson (R), appointed in 2019, won a full term and Jim O'Connor (R) took the third seat, about 54,000 votes ahead of Eric Sloan (R). Bill Mundell (D) and Shea Stanfield (D) finished fifth and sixth.
• In all, 3 legislative seats changed party, two toward Democrats and one toward Republicans, and 3 incumbents lost. Three other House contests finished within two points: Rep. Jeff Weninger (R) and Rep. Jennifer Pawlik (D) both held their seats in District 17, edging Liz Harris (R); Brenda Barton (R) beat Coral Evans (D) for the second seat in District 6; and Beverly Pingerelli (R) and Rep. Kevin Payne (R) held off Kathy Knecht (D) in District 21.
• Voters approved both statewide ballot measures. Proposition 207 legalized recreational marijuana four years after rejecting it; regulators licensed the first dispensaries for recreational sales in January 2021. Proposition 208, the teacher-backed Invest in Education Act, added a surcharge on income above $250,000 for schools. Its passage was a rebuke to Gov. Doug Ducey (R) and business groups who spent millions against it. The tax did not survive: after the Arizona Supreme Court ruled it could not push school spending over the state's constitutional limit, a trial judge struck it down in March 2022.

Legislature

• House (60 seats): 29 D, 31 R before the election, 29 D, 31 R after; control stayed with Republicans.
• Senate (30 seats): 13 D, 17 R before the election, 14 D, 16 R after; control stayed with Republicans.

Statewide races

Legislative races

Ballot measures