Ballot Math / Secretary of State

Statewide race: Secretary of State

Secretary of State: the official who runs the elections

November 3, 2026 general election. Adrian Fontes (D, incumbent), Alexander Kolodin (R), Duwayne Collier (G).

What this office does: the Secretary of State is Arizona's chief election officer. The office certifies statewide results and voting equipment, writes the Elections Procedures Manual that every county follows, and oversees voter registration. It is also first in line to the governorship today, though that changes with this election: starting this cycle, Arizona elects a lieutenant governor on a joint ticket (Proposition 131, passed 2022), who will stand first in line once sworn in. Beyond elections, the office keeps the state seal, commissions notaries, and registers lobbyists, charities, and trade names.

The race at a glance

Fontes was unopposed in the Democratic primary. Kolodin won the Republican primary over former state party chair Gina Swoboda, 59.8 percent to 40.2 percent. Sabato's Crystal Ball rates the race Likely Democrat. October polling had Fontes ahead, narrowly or comfortably depending on the pollster: HighGround (October 6 to 8) had Fontes 45, Kolodin 34; Equis Research (September) had Fontes 46, Kolodin 44. The two men have been on opposite sides of Arizona election litigation for six years, including a case against each other.

Adrian Fontes (Democrat, incumbent)

Born 1970 in Nogales, Arizona. U.S. Marine Corps, 1992 to 1996. Prosecutor in Denver, Maricopa County, and the Arizona Attorney General's Office, then private practice. Maricopa County Recorder, 2017 to 2021. Secretary of State since January 2, 2023; he won the office in 2022 with 52.4 percent over Mark Finchem, the widest margin of any statewide Arizona Democrat that year.

  • Election administration: ran the 2024 cycle; his office expanded BallotTrax ballot tracking and says his office won U.S. Election Assistance Commission awards for election administration and security innovation three consecutive years, 2023 to 2025.
  • The voter-data fight: Fontes refused the Trump Justice Department's demand, first made in July 2025, for Arizona's unredacted voter registration database, citing privacy law. The DOJ sued in January 2026. On April 28, 2026, a federal judge appointed by President Trump dismissed the case with prejudice, holding the federal government has no legal right to the database. The DOJ is appealing. Fontes: "I will continue to protect your personal identifying information from these illegal requests no matter what."
  • The rulebook fights: in October 2025 the Arizona Supreme Court ruled unanimously for Fontes that his Elections Procedures Manual does not have to go through formal rulemaking, and the Court of Appeals later dismissed the Republican challenges to individual provisions in the manual for lack of standing.
  • Mail voting: he defends the system roughly 80 percent of Arizonans use, intervened against federal efforts to restrict mail voting, and opposes the federal SAVE America Act, arguing Arizona already requires documented proof of citizenship to register.
  • October 2026: Fontes and Attorney General Mayes sued Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap on October 21, asking a court to restore the registrations of 25 confirmed U.S. citizens whose records remained flagged ineligible after Heap marked 60 voters as potential noncitizens. County investigators found 52 of the 60 were citizens.
  • The 2020 case he lost: as Maricopa County Recorder in 2020, Fontes instructed mail voters that they could cross out and correct a vote on their ballot. The Arizona Supreme Court ruled the instruction was not authorized. The lawyer who beat him in that case was Alexander Kolodin.
  • Money: raised about $519,000 in the second quarter of 2026 and ended June with roughly $1 million on hand. The Arizona Republic reported October 23 that he has raised $2.7 million for the cycle, and that $1.5 million in TV ads had run in the race, most of it benefiting Fontes.
  • Dispute with the Recorder, both sides: Recorder Heap accuses Fontes of withholding felony records the counties need to cancel ineligible registrations, saying Fontes "lied to Arizonans, neglected his duty, and moved only when public pressure left him no choice." The records were released in October 2026. Fontes's office says the delay was Washington's: the DOJ sent unusable files for over a year, and usable data was forwarded to counties immediately when it finally arrived.

Alexander Kolodin (Republican)

Born 1986 in Chandler; lives in Scottsdale. Georgetown and University of Pennsylvania law. Former teacher; Reagan Fellow at the Goldwater Institute; election law practice. State representative, District 3, since January 2023; Arizona Freedom Caucus member; chaired the House Select Committee on Election Integrity.

  • A courtroom record against the incumbent: Kolodin has practiced Arizona election law for over a decade. He beat Recorder Fontes at the Arizona Supreme Court in 2020 over the ballot correction instruction, and won a 2024 ruling requiring Fontes to comply with federal voter-registration list duties. His campaign biography: "Fighting for transparency and lawful elections in the Courtroom."
  • 2020 work: he served as local counsel on the post-2020 "Kraken" lawsuit seeking to overturn Joe Biden's Arizona win (dismissed), represented participants in the alternate electors plan and argued the Trump electors "simply created a backup plan," represented the Cyber Ninjas audit firm, and represented state GOP chair Kelli Ward in her fight against the January 6 committee's subpoena of her phone records.
  • State Bar discipline: in December 2023 Kolodin agreed to discipline from the Arizona State Bar for his 2020 election cases: an admonition, probation, required ethics classes, and payment of the proceeding's costs. This is the Fontes campaign's most-cited item against him.
  • Legislative record: sponsored HB 2785 (2024), the bipartisan election package Gov. Hobbs signed, which set binding signature-verification rules, required public posting of election-system audit logs, tightened ballot chain of custody, and lets mail voters show ID to skip signature verification. He also authored the Rio Verde Foothills water bill, passed with a bipartisan supermajority. In 2023 he sued, unsuccessfully, to end no-excuse early voting in Arizona, and he led HCR 2001, which is on your ballot this year as Proposition 144.
  • Priorities, in his framing: "Voter ID is non-negotiable," an "equal protection thing." His Proposition 144 would require government ID for every ballot including mail, codify citizens-only voting, ban foreign election money, and require on-site tabulation. He pledges faster results and says the race is about "protecting every vote, regardless of Party." He rejects the "election denier" label and denies Fontes's charge that he wants to abolish mail voting.
  • Money: raised $73,370 in the second quarter of 2026 and spent about $74,000 with a firm owned by state Sen. Jake Hoffman. Cumulative $605,500 raised as of mid-October. Roughly half of what he had raised by early 2026 was a $95,000 loan he made to his own campaign, and about $194,673 in personal loans were outstanding at the end of 2025.
  • The exchange that sums up the race: Fontes: "His career began with all those ridiculous lawsuits after the 2020 election." Kolodin: "You hear my opponent talk about 2020 because he has no record to run on," and, in their September debate, "Adrian Fontes doesn't know how to follow the law."

Duwayne Collier (Green)

Won the Green primary with 421 votes. Did not take part in the Citizens Clean Elections debate.

  • What voters should know: the Arizona Green Party has disavowed Collier, accusing him of being a Republican plant running to draw votes from Fontes. In September 2026, the Attorney General's Office was reported to be investigating allegations that Collier's campaign, among others, used fraudulent donations with falsified voter information to obtain public campaign funding. Reporting also says his campaign received services from firms and attorneys with Republican connections and paid his wife at least $20,000 as campaign manager. These are allegations and reporting, not findings; no adjudication was found in our research. Collier's own platform did not appear in the major-outlet coverage we reviewed.

Verification notes

  • The quarterly fundraising figures come largely from one July 2026 roundup of the Q2 reports (American Star News). The broad picture, Fontes far ahead on money, is corroborated by the Arizona Republic's October reporting. Exact quarterly figures should be rechecked against the Secretary of State's See the Money filings.
  • Arizona Senate Republican leaders have referred Fontes to the U.S. Department of Justice over alleged obstruction connected to a federal election-records probe, per AZ Free News, a conservative outlet. No DOJ action has been reported. We note the referral here rather than in the record section because it rests on a single partisan source.
  • A quote attributed to Kolodin at a May 2026 forum, that the 2020 election "was stolen fair and square," circulates via an advocacy outlet. We could not find it in a neutral source, so it is not printed above as his words.

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 needs to reach you.
  • Leaving any item blank is allowed and does not affect the rest of your ballot, including this race.

Sources

Ballot Math: analysis only, no endorsements. Every candidate in this race got the same template: record, money, stated priorities, sources. Back to Ballot Math home. Also see Prop 144 and Corporation Commission.