PHOENIX — Arizona Senate Republicans have taken legal action in an attempt to compel Gov. Katie Hobbs to submit nominees to the Legislature's vetting committee for agency directors.
Back in September, the Democratic governor announced she was withdrawing all her remaining cabinet nominees to run the state's agencies due to "partisan obstructionism" from the Arizona Senate Committee on Director Nominations.
Hobbs said her withdrawn nominees would serve as executive deputy directors for their respective agencies until the Arizona Senate "returns to the regular confirmation process."
Now Senate leadership is responding by filing a special complaint in Maricopa County Superior Court that seeks to have the governor submit her director nominees to the Legislature by the first week of the upcoming session.
"In refusing to nominate agency directors and bypassing the Senate’s advice and consent processes, the Governor has violated a binding statutory directive, acted in excess of her lawful authority, and failed to perform a nondiscretionary duty," the complaint states.
The state agencies that have yet to have a director nominee confirmed by the Republican-led Senate committee include the departments of economic security, administration, environmental quality, gaming, housing, child safety, lottery, and veteran services.
The issue between Hobbs and Republican lawmakers arose earlier this year after the Senate confirmation committee started rejecting some of the governor's cabinet nominees.
The governor wrote to Senate President Warren Petersen that the committee seemed to have imposed "impossible" standards for approving nominees, thus resulting in Hobbs choosing not to have any more nominees be subjected to hearings.
The complaint filed by Petersen and the Arizona Senate seeks to have the courts declare that Hobbs violated state statute by appointing deputy directors to run state agencies without Senate approval.