In Arizona, Democrats and Republicans are banding together for one reason

In Arizona, the two legacy political parties are in a panic. From the intensity of their response, you would think the recently renamed Arizona Independent Party (AIP), with a modest footprint and a broad vision, represents an existential threat. The reaction was so strong that Democrats and Republicans banded together to prevent the AIP’s name change from the No Labels Party of Arizona.

Simply using the word “independent” in the name of a political party was enough to send them pleading to the courts that they would be forced to compete for the independent vote. They argued that Secretary of State Adrian Fontes (D), who accepted the party’s right to change its name, had exceeded his authority. And a judge agreed. The independents are now moving to appeal.

For decades, Democrats and Republicans have built, manipulated and operated within a system that insulates them from competition. Districts are drawn to protect incumbents.

Primaries are dominated by a narrow slice of highly motivated voters. Rules are written to discourage challengers, including ballot access requirements that favor the dominantparties. The result is a political marketplace with leaders under little pressure to innovate,adapt or solve today’s problems.

AIP, for the time being officially the No Labels Party, represents a credible effort to create apathway for independent-minded candidates in Arizona to access the ballot and compete on more equal footing. It also provides an opportunity for voters to support leaders who more closely represent them and their priorities. Predictably, responses from the two major parties have been swift, effectively aligned and revealing.

When the national No Labels organization tried to appear on the ballot in Arizona in 2023, Democrats challenged it in court and lost. The more recent battle by the two parties to stop the name change is not about policy or governance. It was about maintaining their shareddominance over the electoral process.

The AIP chose its name because it elevated the principle of nonpartisanship. Toward the end of 2025, the party’s leadership polled members, adopted the name change and notified Fontes.

It didn’t take long for the Arizona Democratic Party, the Arizona Republican Party, the Republican National Committee and the Clean Elections Commission to each file litigation that a judge combined into one lawsuit. On March 18, more than a dozen lawyers, some dispatched by party leaders in D.C., were in the courtroom fighting over the fate of this potential disruption of the status quo.

The judge ruled on March 25 that Fontes did not have the authority to accept the name change, and we intend to appeal. As the case played out, Republicans in the state legislature filed a bill prohibiting the use of “independent” in a political party name. They wanted an insurance policy to deny the use of that explosive term.

The structural barriers that prevent political competition in Arizona are stark. A Democrat or Republican candidate for statewide office needs roughly 7,000 signatures to qualify for the ballot. An unaffiliated candidate must gather closer to 45,000. That is a deliberate discrepancy reflecting a deeper truth about how the system views competition.

Because the No Labels Party has general election ballot access by virtue of its political party status and an automatic primary in the case of multiple candidates for a given office, its candidates qualify for the lower signature requirement under state law. The two major parties simply do not want a competitor whose candidates focus on unaffiliated voters —the fastest-growing segment of Arizona voters and roughly a third of the state’s voters — to qualify for that more equitable standard.

The election clock is ticking, and the parties continue their assault on voter choice. Our candidate signature petitions were challenged, mainly by the Democratic Party, part of a desperate attempt to remove competition for independent and independent-minded voters. One independent gubernatorial candidate, Hugh Lytle, who survived these challenges, had to go through two court battles.

The national Republicans, for their part, have been busy attempting to seize direct control over voter lists, gerrymandering congressional districts, trying to restrict who can vote and using other tools to greatly diminish the equity of America’s voting systems.

The result is a political structure that increasingly struggles to deliver solutions to the country’s most pressing problems. From education and health care to fiscal stability and resource management, meaningful solutions require coalitions and innovative and pragmatic thinking. When candidates win their primaries with partisan appeals, the incentive to govern by building consensus around forward-looking solutions disappears.

The emergence of AIP and a movement focused on unaffiliated voters in Arizona has exposed this dynamic in real time.

This is not about simply adding another party to the mix. It is about creating a system where competition can exist at all. Where voters, not structures, determine outcomes. And where new ideas and new solutions are not filtered out before they can even be heard.