Ballot Math / Arizona Legislature / LD12

Candidate races: Arizona Legislature, District 12

LD12: the district where one party forgot to field a team

November 3, 2026 general election. District 12 covers Ahwatukee, west Chandler, southwest Tempe, and part of the Gila River Indian Community, about 239,000 people. Registration: 33 percent Democratic, 31 percent Republican, 36 percent other. The Independent Redistricting Commission rated the district "not competitive," with a composite Democratic advantage of about 14.7 points, and recent results match: the Democratic Senate candidate won with 58 percent in 2024. No forecaster publishes a rating for these specific races.

State Senate: Contreras vs. Ramirez, and the missing Republican

The structural fact: incumbent Sen. Mitzi Epstein (D) is not running again, and no Republican filed for this seat by the March 23, 2026 deadline. The printed ballot offers the Democratic nominee and a No Labels nominee. The only Republican in the race, Gary Hatch, is an official write-in. No reporting we found explains the Republican recruitment failure; it is simply the fact of the race, and the No Labels candidate's whole campaign is built on it.

Patricia "Patty" Contreras (Democrat)

LD12 state representative since January 2023 (elected 2022, reelected 2024), now running for the open Senate seat with Sen. Epstein's endorsement; she won her Senate primary unopposed. Before the Legislature: City of Phoenix Parks and Recreation and Human Services departments, including Human Services Program Coordinator 2014 to 2021. Master's from Northern Arizona University, bachelor's from ASU. A rank-and-file member of the minority caucus; committees include Government, Health and Human Services, Natural Resources/Energy/Water, and Transportation and Infrastructure (one listing source omits Government; see verification notes).

Key votes (verified individually; see the note on depth in the verification box):

  • HB 2677 (2024), repeal of the 1864 near-total abortion ban: YES. She was one of the bill's 25 sponsors; it passed the House 32-28 with all Democrats and three Republicans, and Gov. Hobbs signed it.
  • HCR 2001 (2026), the referral that became Prop 144 (the FAST Election Results Act): NO. Her no vote was on sending the ID-for-every-ballot amendment to you; Prop 144 itself is covered on its own page.
  • HCR 2016 (2026), a ballot referral to require precinct-based voting: NO. HCR 2056 (2026), a constitutional right to refuse medical mandates: NO.
  • HB 2133 (2026), age and consent verification for sexual material published online: NO (conference report). HB 2223 (2026), disclosure when a registered sex offender requests a legal name change: YES.

Her own bills tell a consistent story: a 2025 cluster on housing and consumer protection (short-term rental regulation, online lodging marketplace reporting, an Attorney General deed fraud registry, owner notice on recorded instruments, housing assistance for the elderly, landlord-tenant notice rules), plus bills on the gay/trans panic defense, conversion therapy funding for minors, and broad antidiscrimination protections. Scorecards, attributed: Sierra Club chapter ratings of 92 and 100 percent with an endorsement; NFIB-Arizona 33 percent; Freedom Index lifetime score 22.

Stated priorities, in her words: climate change and fair policies for "our limited water resources"; protecting voting rights (she has volunteered as a poll watcher); "I believe in a Woman's Right to choose"; better treatment for veterans; support for union workers and the PRO Act; affordable daycare; "sensible gun reform" including mandatory waiting periods, licensing, closing the gun show loophole, and banning "assault style weapons of war"; fully funded public education with higher teacher pay and smaller classes; private prison reform.

Money: as of her March 2026 campaign finance reports, raised $22,137, spent $7,403, $31,324 on hand. That date is part of the fact: no later figure was retrieved, and her totals will have changed since.

Controversies: none of significance found. One procedural episode: in 2026 a Republican committee chair declined to hear her strike-everything amendment and declined to recognize her motion, part of a broader failed Democratic "Affordability Agenda" push. That is minority-party life at the Capitol, reported as such.

Anthony Jason Ramirez (No Labels)

Former police officer, attorney (described by Tempe News as a civil rights attorney), and business owner. He was the attorney for the Arizona Independent Party, formerly the No Labels Party, in the litigation over the party's name; he called the bill at issue "cartel protection." His ballot designation remains No Labels. He won the No Labels primary with 445 votes.

  • His pitch is the vacancy: he calls himself a "Conservative Independent," argues that not voting hands the seat to Contreras, whom he calls a "progressive" and "proud Democrat," and told azcentral he would not commit to either caucus and would "vote bill-by-bill." He spoke at the LD12 Republican Party's September 2026 meeting alongside Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap, evidence the local GOP treats him as the de facto alternative.
  • Stated priorities: protect the long-term water supply; public safety; improve schools and workforce pipelines; a "strong voice against data centers"; and pushing all district cities to ban Flock license plate cameras.
  • Debate note, both attributions: Clean Elections scheduled an LD12 debate for August 20, 2026; Ballot Access News later noted Ramirez did not debate in the Clean Elections series.
  • Money: no campaign finance figures located as of October 26, 2026.

Gary Hatch (Republican, official write-in)

This entry is short because the public record is empty, and inventing a biography would be worse than admitting it.

Hatch appears on the certified ballot as the Republican official write-in for Senate District 12, which means votes written in for him count. Beyond that listing, our research found no campaign website, no news coverage, no public biography, no occupation, and no mention by the LD12 Republican organization as of October 26, 2026. If you are a Republican in LD12 looking for your party's Senate candidate, this write-in line is, verifiably, what your party's recruitment produced this cycle. (Do not confuse him with G. Seville Hatch, a different person running as a write-in for Congress in District 9.)

State House: two seats, three candidates, one Republican

How this race works: vote for up to two. With only one Republican running, David Richardson needs merely a top-two finish to take a seat, while the two Democrats must finish first and second to hold both. The same structure applied in 2024, when the lone Republican finished third, about 15,000 votes behind the second Democrat. There are no official write-ins in this race.

Anastasia "Stacey" Travers (Democrat, incumbent)

LD12 state representative since January 2023, and the House Democratic Whip for the current legislature, elected by her caucus. Born in Athens, Greece, to a U.S. military father and a Greek mother; served as a Russian intelligence interceptor in the U.S. Army; geosciences degree from the University of Arizona; worked with disabled veterans and the unsheltered in the United Kingdom and as a legislative liaison in Sacramento; an AMVETS advocate on veteran women's issues, homelessness, and disability. Ranking member of the Military Affairs and Public Safety Committee; member of Natural Resources, Energy and Water; also serves on the Governor's Water Policy Council.

Key votes (verified individually): HB 2677 (2024, repeal of the 1864 abortion ban): YES, and a sponsor. HB 2133 (2026, online age and consent verification): NO. HCR 2016 (2026, precinct-based voting referral): NO. HCR 2056 (2026, medical mandates): DID NOT VOTE, printed here as a non-vote, not a position. A State Affairs analysis found she was one of three House Democrats tied for the most bills signed by the governor in the 2026 session, with two enacted.

Her two signature fights:

  • Clergy reporting (HB 2454, 2023; reintroduced 2026). Her bill would remove the clergy-penitent exemption so clergy must report child abuse disclosed in confession. The Republican-run Judiciary Committee refused to hear it. Travers says she brought it at the request of members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and modeled the reintroduction on a similar Washington State law. Rep. Andy Biggs publicly called it "a terrible attack on Catholics in Arizona." That exchange, her stated origin for the bill and a sitting congressman's attack on it, is the whole controversy; there is no scandal underneath it.
  • Franchise regulation (HB 2404, 2023; refiled as HB 2038 for 2026). The bill would limit franchisor termination and non-renewal to "good cause" with a franchisee right to sue. It passed a House committee, then stalled after lobbying by the International Franchise Association, which called it what "would create the most onerous franchise law anywhere in the United States." Travers: "It's important that small business owners know that there's somebody out there fighting for them against private equity."

Stated priorities (azcentral): defend water resource management, education, and voting rights. Scorecards and endorsements, attributed: Sierra Club ratings of 42 and 100 percent in two listings with an endorsement; Institute for Legislative Analysis 11 percent (2023); Freedom Index 17; endorsed by the Communications Workers, Reproductive Freedom for All, Stonewall Democrats of Arizona, and VoteVets.

Money: no clean cycle total for her was retrievable without mixing cycles, so none is printed. That restraint is deliberate.

Armando Montero (Democrat)

Senior planning analyst at ASU. Elected to the Tempe Union High School District governing board in 2020 while still an ASU student (accounts conflict on whether he was 18 or 19, the youngest member in that board's history) and reelected in 2024; he serves as board president. ASU Barrett Honors graduate (May 2023) with three degrees, political science, economics, and mathematics/statistics. A 2022 Harry S. Truman Scholar. He would likely be the first Gen Z member of the Arizona Legislature.

  • Board record, in his account to ASU News: he chaired the advisory committee that wrote Tempe Union's comprehensive mental health policy (adopted 2021; suicide prevention, intervention, and follow-up), which he calls "likely the most comprehensive mental health policy in the state"; on his watch the district cut its student-to-counselor ratio to close to 1-to-400 and doubled its CARE 7 crisis specialists per school.
  • Stated priorities: guardrails on the Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program; higher education attainment; affordable and accessible housing and health care; expanding Medicaid coverage; great public schools and workforce pathways; a worker-centered, affordable economy; water security.
  • Money: no campaign finance totals located. Controversies: none found.

David Richardson (Republican)

Arizona native, ASU graduate, married with children. Business owner; CEO of a local bioscience company since 2016, where he helped develop drug discovery and diagnostic tools and a company that processed COVID-19 testing kits early in the pandemic. Backed by Turning Point Action, per Tempe News. He is running as a Clean Elections participating candidate, meaning public financing after collecting qualifying contributions, not a traditional donor campaign.

  • Prior campaign, with the numbers checked: he ran for this Senate seat in 2022, won the Republican primary by 170 votes (12,248 to 12,078), and lost the general election to Epstein, 58.1 to 41.9 percent, on 42,008 votes. His own party's candidate profile says "16,341 votes," which contradicts the official count; the percentages match, the vote total in the profile appears wrong, and this page prints the official figures.
  • Stated priorities (his LD12 GOP profile and azcentral): government's "highest calling is to seek the prosperity of its people," built on strong education, public safety, thriving businesses, and a secure water supply; innovative budgets that reduce taxpayer costs; he calls it "a violation of our duty" to saddle the next generation with debt and high taxes; and strengthening the educational and business pathways that worked for him.
  • Money: consistent with a Clean Elections qualifying drive, his TransparencyUSA listing shows small-dollar items only, his largest listed contributor being himself at $444. No cycle total was published on the records retrieved.

Verification notes

  • Key-vote depth is this page's known shortfall. Six votes for Contreras and four for Travers were verified individually (several via Vote Smart). The HB 2677 votes rest on the Associated Press's reporting that all 29 House Democrats voted yes, plus both members' sponsorship of the bill; that is strong sourcing, but it is party-unanimity reporting, not an individual roll-call line, and other tempting party-line votes were deliberately not added without name-level sources.
  • No source found breaks the 2024 presidential vote down by legislative district, so this page uses the Redistricting Commission's composite spread instead of substituting a congressional or county figure.
  • Money is thin across this page and dated where it exists. Ramirez, Montero, and a clean Travers cycle total were not located; Richardson's funding model is Clean Elections, which is why his private fundraising looks near zero.
  • Small conflicts preserved rather than resolved: Contreras's committee list (one source adds Government), Montero's age when first elected (18 or 19), and the LD12 GOP profile's vote count for Richardson (addressed in his entry).

How to vote without getting your ballot rejected

  • Mail it by Tuesday, October 27, 2026. After that day, do not mail it: use a drop box or a vote center.
  • It must be received by 7 p.m. on Election Day, Tuesday, November 3, 2026. Postmarks do not count.
  • Sign and date the affidavit envelope, and write a current phone number on it. If your signature is questioned, the county will try to reach you.
  • Leaving any item blank is allowed and does not affect the rest of your ballot.
  • For write-ins: only votes for officially filed write-in candidates are counted (in the Senate race, that is Gary Hatch). Write the name exactly and fill the oval.

Sources

Ballot Math: analysis only, no endorsements. Same template as every race on this site: offices and record, key votes, money with dates, stated priorities, controversies with responses, and gaps admitted in the open. Back to Ballot Math home.