A Maricopa County judge ruled Thursday that a challenge to the initiative that attempts to crack down on illegal immigrants came too late -- 11 days before the election.
Opponents of Proposition 200 filed a lawsuit last Friday to remove the initiative from the ballot because 90 percent of about 15,000 petitions contained a wording error.
Proposition 200 would require all Arizonans to provide proof of citizenship when registering to vote, show identification when voting and provide proof of eligibility in order to receive non-federally mandated public benefits.
The initiative would also make it a crime for state and local government employees to fail to report suspected illegal immigrants seeking public benefits.
The petitions in question stated Proposition 200 would require citizens to provide proof in order to receive "public welfare benefits."
But the word "welfare" is not on the official ballot. This means that if Proposition 200 passes, it could prevent undocumented immigrants from receiving virtually any public benefits, including police, ambulance and library services.
Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Margaret Downie ruled that even if the challenge were valid, she doesn't have the authority to stop votes from being counted; state law would only allow her to stop the issue from appearing on the ballot. But thousands of voters have already voted early.
Proponents of the measure say the discrepancy does not matter because voters can read the correct wording of the measure on the ballot.
Cordelia Candelaria, ASU professor and chairwoman of the Department of Chicana and Chicano studies, said she was very disappointed with the ruling.
"Since federal and state laws already prohibit voter fraud and abuse of publicly funded social services, Proposition 200 would only add costly red tape requirements to Arizona's budget," Candelaria said.
The result of the latest KAET-ASU Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication poll shows the support for the initiative has dropped by 9 percentage points since a September poll. In its latest statewide poll of 573 registered voters, 54 percent said they would vote for Proposition 200. Thirty-one percent said they would vote against it, and 15 percent were undecided.
The poll had a margin of error of 4.1 percentage points.
Poll director Bruce Merrill said there is a 50-50 chance the initiative will pass.
"There has been a fairly significant erosion of support for the initiative over the last three months," Merrill said. "Whether Proposition 200 will pass or not will depend on how much money each side will spend on advertisements to get their message out to voters."
Reach the reporter at laosamoa.poasa@asu.edu.
