States United Democracy Center (SUDC) has provided free official work for Arizona’s top three Democratic officials.
On its website, SUDC says it is a “nonpartisan organization advancing free, fair, and secure elections.” However, according to Influence Watch, this nonprofit acts left-leaning.
When Governor Katie Hobbs was Secretary of State (AZSOS), she used SUDC as free legal counsel to push back against then-Attorney General Mark Brnovich’s election litigation. As governor, Hobbs has continued using SUDC’s services. SUDC provided law enforcement training to the office of Secretary of State Adrian Fontes before the 2024 election.
The Arizona Sun Times previously covered SUDC’s work providing a legal blueprint for Attorney General Kris Mayes to prosecute the 2020 alternate electoral slate for Donald Trump and their associates, which she appeared to closely follow with her prosecution.
The Arizona Republic dug into the ties between the three Democratic officials and SUDC. The paper found that the SUDC, which focuses on elections, has prioritized certain states, including Arizona.
“We do focus on the states where the need is the greatest, and we assess that based on the places where elections are most closely contested, the places where there’s the most litigation and the states are most under-resourced to meet that need,” President and Chief Executive Officer Joanna Lydgate told The Republic.
She said the group focuses on “where are the places where we think there might be the greatest level of threat. And Arizona kind of checks all of those boxes.”
The Republic reported that SUDC “convened regular phone calls for election officials to keep them apprised of misinformation” that sometimes included a staffer from the office of previous Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer, an election fraud denier. Richer has a history of working with CISA to silence alleged election misinformation. He once thanked SUDC for letting him “piggyback” on SUDC’s anti-speech operations, The Federalist reported. The recorder’s office told The Federalist that it receives information from SUDC “regarding election worker safety and, as we do with all new information, taken it into consideration.”
There has been a revolving door between Hobbs’ attorney, Bo Dul, working for her in government and SUDC.
Dul served as elections director and attorney to Hobbs when Hobbs led the AZSOS. Dul left to work for SUDC for a year. After Hobbs became governor, Dul returned to work for her as general counsel. The Republic said Dul signed a contract with SUDC to continue its work for Hobbs, but when they requested a copy, “[t]he exact scope of their work was redacted.”
Attorney Dennis Wilenchik, who is representing one of the targets of Mayes’ prosecution, told The Republic there is evidence Mayes relied on the legal blueprint SUDC provided her with since, despite denials from her office, it was attached to four search warrants filed by Mayes’ deputies.
The SUDC’s work for the three top Democratic officials has escaped Arizona’s laws on contracts, such as regarding competitive bidding since it is done for free.
The SUDC claims to be nonpartisan by including Republicans who take Democrat positions on issues in its leadership. None of the objectives on its website appear to be conservative. The SUDC began as a progressive State Leaders Committee project called the Voter Protection Program, which supports progressive attorney general policies nationwide.
According to Influence Watch, a Capital Research Center (CRC) project, SUDC was formed in 2020 to “coordinate left-leaning advocacy groups and Democratic campaign committees in the event that then-President Donald Trump lost and subsequently contested the results of the 2020 Presidential Election.” After the 2020 election, SUDC’s legal team got involved in opposing attempts by Trump and the Republican Party to contest the election and opposing audits. The group praised the weaponization of the justice system against Trump.
CRC said the SUDC’s “main job remains promoting left-of-center election policies” and noted that it published a “playbook for the 2024 election.”
SUDC also worked to oppose Republican-backed election administration laws and proposals and to get legislation passed barring the J6 protesters from running for office. Maya Ingram, a senior policy development counsel with SUDC, told NBC, “[L]egislators are coming up with new ways to interfere with elections. … [E]ven when these bills don’t become law, they keep lies and conspiracy theories alive and sustain the election denier movement.”
SUDC created a map of the U.S. titled “23 Election Deniers hold statewide office in 17 states.” In March, the SUDC labeled numerous state legislators as “election deniers,” including 31 in Arizona. The SUDC launched a website where voters can determine whether a candidate on their ballot is an election denier.
While at SUDC, Dul contacted Richer about getting conservative Arizona State University Law professor Aaron Ludwig fired for expressing views on X about election integrity. SUDC filed bar complaints against Trump’s attorneys, including John Eastman and Kari Lake’s attorney, Kurt Olsen. Senior Counsel Gillian Feiner said, “Kurt Olsen has abused his law license to spread lies about our elections in the courtroom time and time again, and his pattern of unethical conduct shows he’s not going to stop.” A State Bar of Arizona disciplinary panel dismissed an election complaint against Olsen in August.
Last September, Lizzie Ulmer, senior vice president of strategy for SUDC, called to prosecute and fire anyone who pushes back on certifying elections.
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Rachel Alexander is a reporter at The Arizona Sun Times and The Star News Network. Follow Rachel on Twitter / X. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Katie Hobbs” by Katie Hobbs.
