Ballot Math / Arizona Legislature / LD2
Candidate races: Arizona Legislature, District 2

LD2: north Phoenix, the swing district that splits its ticket

November 3, 2026 general election. District 2 covers a section of north Phoenix in Maricopa County, including the Deer Valley, Norterra, and Moon Valley areas, about 246,674 people. The district lies entirely within Maricopa County. Registration: 35.90 percent Republican, 27.38 percent Democratic, 36.72 percent other (2026 general election guide). The Independent Redistricting Commission rated the district highly competitive, with a composite Republican advantage of only about 3.8 points, and the 2024 presidential vote inside the district went Republican by 5.6 points. Voters here split the 2024 legislative ticket, electing a Republican senator, a Democratic representative, and a Republican representative. The Arizona Republic and the Arizona Agenda both treat LD2 as one of the competitive districts that will decide control of the Legislature; no forecaster publishes a rating for these specific races.

State Senate: Bolick vs. Gallitano in the marquee swing seat

The structural fact: this race is genuinely contested. Bolick won the seat in 2024 by 50.82 to 47.15 percent, with a Green candidate taking 2.03 percent, a margin of about 3,800 votes. There is no third candidate on the 2026 ballot. Whoever wins this head to head race holds one of the seats that decides the Senate majority, which Republicans currently hold 17 to 13.

Shawnna Bolick (Republican, incumbent)

State senator since July 2023, appointed by the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors to replace Sen. Steve Kaiser, then elected in her own right in 2024. Before that, two terms in the state House (2019 to 2023). Earlier work: consultant to the Arizona Charter School Association and the Goldwater Institute, plus state advisory roles on education and child development. She ran for secretary of state in 2022 and lost the Republican primary to Mark Finchem, finishing third in a four candidate field. She is married to Arizona Supreme Court Justice Clint Bolick, and she is the author of a Phoenix family guide book, "Playtime in Phoenix." The Arizona Agenda describes her as one of the few Senate Republicans who sometimes steps out of line with her party, and notes she most recently chaired the Senate Ethics Committee. She beat Timothy Ferrara in the 2026 primary, 71.44 to 28.56 percent.

Key vote (verified at name level): on May 1, 2024, Bolick was the first legislative Republican, alongside Sen. T. J. Shope, to vote YES on repealing the 1864 near total abortion ban, joining all Senate Democrats to pass the repeal 16 to 14, one week after the House passed it 32 to 28. That single vote is the clearest marker of where she differs from her caucus, and the Arizona Agenda cites it the same way.

Her bills and stated priorities: the Arizona Republic reports her campaign has prioritized public safety and consumer protection, and credits her with bills that expanded consumer protections and created a grant program to assist victims of human trafficking. In October 2026 she led 35 Republican lawmakers in asking Gov. Hobbs to opt Arizona into the federal Education Freedom Tax Credit before its January 1, 2027 launch, after Hobbs said she was waiting for federal guidance. Her own October 2026 posts describe bipartisan work to provide tax relief, eliminate taxes on tips, overtime, and retirement pay, make housing more affordable, and protect the water supply.

Money: no 2026 cycle total for Bolick was located in the sources retrieved. Her committee, Vote Bolick, has a TransparencyUSA candidate page, but no raised, spent, or cash on hand figure from a dated Arizona report is printed here because none was retrieved; see verification notes.

Controversies, with her side: after the 2020 election, Bolick urged Congress to throw out Arizona's presidential results and give the state's electoral votes to Donald Trump, and in January 2021 she introduced HB 2720, which would have let the Legislature revoke the secretary of state's certification of presidential electors at any time before the inauguration. The bill died in committee. Reporting by the Arizona Mirror noted the bill came about two months after Ginni Thomas, wife of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, emailed Bolick urging her to help overturn Joe Biden's Arizona victory; Bolick's husband is a longtime friend of Justice Thomas. Bolick's stated position at the time was that the bill aimed to make elections more bipartisan and fill gaps in election law. Separately, in 2020 the Arizona Supreme Court allowed her to stay on the ballot even though she had listed a mailing address instead of her home address on nomination papers, ruling the error was not an intent to defraud, while warning that future candidates doing the same would flirt with disqualification. Most recently, in October 2026, the progressive group Opportunity Arizona called on Bolick and 24 other Republican recipients to return donations from a PAC that a campaign finance complaint alleged was illegally funded by a charter school company; the complaint says Bolick received $1,000 in the 2024 cycle. Attorneys for the PAC defended the contributions as legal and said that if they were not, the blame lies with the PAC's former treasurer. No finding against Bolick herself has been reported.

Amelia Gallitano (Democrat)

First time candidate. Board certified psychiatrist, neuroscientist, and professor at the University of Arizona College of Medicine in Phoenix, where she helped launch the medical school, serves as director of the MD/PhD program, and founded its Women in Medicine and Sciences program in 2017. Her lab studied how genetics and environmental factors affect mental health. She spent nine years caring for veterans with PTSD at the Phoenix VA Medical Center. She won a contested Democratic primary on July 21, 2026, beating Dan Toporek, a veteran and former staffer for U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly, by 77.39 to 22.61 percent.
  • Stated priorities: affordability is the frame of her campaign, with public education and health care accessibility at the center (Arizona Republic). In her Blog for Arizona interview she added energy policy and heat, noting that Maricopa County is the hottest county in the nation with rising heat related deaths, and argued the Legislature needs solutions ready on day one for health care, education, and energy. She also points to federal research funding cuts, saying colleagues can no longer accept graduate students because National Institutes of Mental Health grant funding was cut in half.
  • Endorsements, attributed: Sierra Club, Moms Fed Up, and the science oriented 314 Action Fund (Arizona Republic); ArMPAC, the Arizona medical community's political action committee, which praised her commitment to evidence based policymaking.
  • Money: the March 2026 reports compiled by See the Money showed $0 raised, $0 spent, and $0 on hand for Gallitano, a snapshot that predates her contested primary campaign. No later total was located; see verification notes.
  • Controversies: none found. She declined to answer the Arizona Voter Guide survey, per that guide.

State House: two seats, three candidates, and a 132 vote memory

How this race works: vote for up to two. Democrats fielded only one candidate, incumbent Stephanie Simacek, so at least one Republican will take a seat, and the fight is over the second seat: Simacek against Republicans Justin Wilmeth and Paul Carver for two of the three spots. In 2024 Simacek finished first with 47,801 votes, Wilmeth took the second seat with 46,942, and the second Republican, Ari Daniel Bradshaw, missed by about 132 votes, with an independent candidate taking 10.13 percent. There is no independent in the 2026 race, which changes the math for everyone. Note that Carver is a printed ballot candidate in November even though he reached the ballot as a write in candidate in the July primary.

Justin Wilmeth (Republican, incumbent)

State representative since January 2021, first from District 15 and then, after redistricting, District 2. A consultant by trade and a former child actor. Bachelor's in political science and a master's in public administration from Arizona State University. He chaired the House Commerce Committee in 2023 and 2024 and now chairs the House Committee on Artificial Intelligence and Innovation. He won the second House seat in 2024 only after a recount, finishing with 46,943 votes to Bradshaw's 46,809 in the recount figures reported by Wikipedia. He was unopposed in effect in the 2026 primary, taking 87.90 percent against Carver's write in effort on the Republican side.

Record and key votes (verified at name level):

  • HB 2677 (2024), repeal of the 1864 near total abortion ban: YES. He was one of only three House Republicans who voted for repeal; the bill passed 32 to 28 and Gov. Hobbs signed it. His Senate counterpart Bolick cast the parallel vote in her chamber.
  • HB 2133 (2026), age and consent verification for sexual material published online: YES (conference report, via Vote Smart).
  • Pluto: his 2024 bill designating Pluto as Arizona's official state planet passed and was signed by Gov. Hobbs. Pluto was discovered at Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, which is the stated point of the bill.

Stated priorities: his platform aligns with the state's business community (Arizona Republic). He supports bringing data centers to Arizona, arguing they spark wider economic growth, and in 2026 he sponsored HB 2452, which would require larger counties to plan for data centers and small modular nuclear reactors in their comprehensive plans. He was also one of the few Republicans who supported a Democratic led rental assistance bill in early 2026 aimed at residents struggling to pay rent.

Money: no 2026 cycle total located in the sources retrieved. Controversies: in October 2026 Wilmeth was among the 25 Republican recipients, including Bolick, whom Opportunity Arizona asked to return donations from the PAC described in Bolick's entry, based on a complaint alleging the PAC was illegally corporate funded. The PAC's attorneys defended the contributions as legal. No finding against Wilmeth himself has been reported.

Stephanie Simacek (Democrat, incumbent)

State representative since January 2025, and the top vote getter in this district in 2024, finishing first in a Republican leaning district. A public school teacher by trade. Elected to the Deer Valley Unified School District governing board in 2022, then to the House in 2024. She sits on the House Education committee and a public safety committee, per the Arizona Republic. She and Republican candidate Paul Carver are former Deer Valley school board colleagues. She won her 2026 primary unopposed with 14,490 votes.

Key votes (verified individually via Vote Smart and State Affairs):

  • HCR 2001 (2026), the referral that became Prop 144: NO. HCR 2016 (2026), a ballot referral to require precinct based voting: NO. HB 2022 (2026), moving the primary election date: DID NOT VOTE, printed here as a non vote, not a position.
  • HB 2375 (2026), allowing cities to exempt historic districts from the state middle housing law: YES. State Affairs reported she was one of the last three holdouts on a 31 to 24 vote and cast an aye when the Speaker Pro Tempore closed the board, giving the bill exactly the 31 votes it needed.

Stated priorities: reforms to the state's universal voucher (Empowerment Scholarship Account) program, and opposition to Republican led initiatives to restrict the use of school district funds to support labor unions (Arizona Republic). Her sponsored and co sponsored bills, per LegiEquity, cluster on education and family issues: free school meals appropriations, middle school career and technical education courses, a child neglect exception for financial resources, and landlord tenant fee disclosures.

Money: no 2026 cycle total located in the sources retrieved. Controversies: none of significance found. The Arizona Technology Council endorsed both Simacek and Wilmeth for 2026, a bipartisan pairing that fits this district's split ticket habit.

Paul Carver (Republican)

Former chair of the Legislative District 2 Republicans and a former Deer Valley Unified School District governing board member, where he served alongside Simacek. In 2023 he was a nominee for a legislative vacancy appointment in the district but was not selected. He did not file petitions for the 2026 primary; instead he ran as a Republican write in candidate in the July primary and advanced to the general election with 1,845 write in votes (12.10 percent of the Republican primary vote), a path the Arizona Globe profiled in October 2026 as a grassroots write in campaign.
  • Stated positions: in the Arizona Voter Guide survey he supported expanding state border enforcement, maintaining the universal Empowerment Scholarship Account program without limiting eligibility, increasing criminal penalties for purchasing sex and for fentanyl distribution, stronger voter identification and ballot security, and a legislative referral to repeal Proposition 139, the constitutional right to abortion. He opposed enacting state firearm restrictions beyond current law, adding sexual orientation and gender identity as protected classes, legalizing physician assisted suicide, and expanding recreational marijuana.
  • Controversies, as reported: the Arizona Republic reports Carver has faced scrutiny over ties to far right groups and his presence in Washington, D.C., during the January 6, 2021 riot at the U.S. Capitol. The former head of the Arizona chapter of the Oath Keepers testified before the House Select Committee investigating the attack that he had dinner with Carver the night before the riot. The Republic also identifies Carver as a former leader of the Three Percenters, an anti government group. The Arizona Agenda, in its LD2 preview, described him in one line as "a January 6 participant." No response from Carver to this reporting was located in the sources retrieved; see verification notes.
  • Money: no campaign finance totals located.

Verification notes

  • Money is this page's known shortfall, worse than the Senate races in LD1 and LD3, where March 2026 tables exist. For LD2, the only dated figures retrieved are Gallitano's March 2026 zeros, which predate her primary. No dated 2026 cycle totals for Bolick, Wilmeth, Simacek, or Carver were located as of October 27, 2026, and none are printed rather than guessed.
  • Key vote depth varies by member. Bolick's 2024 abortion repeal vote and Wilmeth's parallel House vote are verified at name level. Simacek has four verified votes. Vote Smart's key votes page for Bolick rendered without individual vote directions in the version retrieved, so her other votes were deliberately not reconstructed from chamber totals or party lines.
  • Carver's January 6 and group affiliation material rests on Arizona Republic reporting of congressional testimony and on the Arizona Agenda's characterization. Both are attributed in his entry. His campaign's response was not found in the sources checked, and this page does not state that he entered the Capitol, because no source retrieved says that.
  • The October 2026 PAC complaint concerns a political committee's funding, not findings against the individual candidates who received its donations in 2024. The amounts and the PAC attorneys' response are printed as reported by the Arizona Mirror and syndicated coverage.
  • Debate note: the Arizona Agenda hosted an LD2 debate in the fall of 2026 and reported, before the event, that only the two Democratic candidates had confirmed while the three Republicans had not yet RSVP'd. Whether all five ultimately appeared was not verified in the sources retrieved.

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 instead.
  • It must be received by 7 p.m. on Election Day, Tuesday, November 3. Postmarks do not count.
  • Sign and date the affidavit envelope, and write a current phone number on it.
  • For write-ins: only votes for officially filed write-in candidates are counted. No official write-in candidates for the LD2 Senate or House races were listed in the sources checked for this page. Paul Carver appears as a printed name on the November ballot; you do not need to write him in. Write the name exactly and fill the oval if you use the line for anyone else.
  • Leaving any item blank is allowed. It does not affect the rest of your ballot.

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.