Don’t talk about Donald

If President Donald Trump is really “on the ballot” this year, you’d never know it from Republican Congressman Juan Ciscomani’s campaign website.

Or his political ads. Or his personal Twitter feed.

Ciscomani isn’t alone in downplaying his ties to Trump on his campaign website. Many Republicans are doing the same thing, including some who skipped the Republican midterm convention a few weeks back, aka “Trumpapalooza.”

For example, Congressman Eli Crane scrubbed his campaign website of pledges — opposing "forever wars," reining in spending — that clash with his votes for some of Trump’s signature acts, like starting a war with Iran, the Arizona Mirror reported earlier this month. Crane is a Republican running for reelection in Congressional District 2 and facing stiff competition from a Democrat, just like Ciscomani.

There are a total of four references to Trump on Ciscomani’s entire campaign webpage, and they are all buried in old press releases from a previous campaign cycle. Three mentions appear in a single endorsement from 2022, coming from former Trump national security adviser Robert O’Brien. The fourth reference appears in another 2022 endorsement, this one from Republican U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik.

Instead, the only endorsements on his endorsement page come from about two dozen elected officials and former local politicians.

That’s on purpose, said Ciscomani campaign spokesman Daniel Scarpinato.

There is an important distinction between Ciscomani’s campaign website and his official congressional website. The latter still refers to Trump regularly, including in Ciscomani’s weekly newsletter.

Campaigns are about selling yourself, and Ciscomani has been laser-focused on attacking Democratic rival JoAnna Mendoza and championing the federal funding he has brought home to the competitive district.

Mendoza’s campaign continues to release polls showing her in the lead in the highly competitive congressional district, but her advantage remains within the margin of error.

Ciscomani won the district by about 2.5 percentage points in 2024, while Trump carried it by less than 1 percentage point. In other words, Ciscomani outperformed the top of his party’s ticket two years ago.

Former Arizona U.S. Sen. Jeff Flake explained why his fellow Republicans might not want to share the stage with the leader of the free world.

Plus, Ciscomani had a get-out-of-jail-free card for missing Trumpapalooza: He had a Clean Elections debate with Mendoza on the convention’s final night.

Even then, he didn’t exactly highlight his support for Trump.

He mentioned “Trump” three times during the debate, but otherwise focused on attacking Mendoza. (For what it’s worth, Mendoza’s website mentions Trump 12 times across various press releases.)

And at least some typically reliable Republican voters are pissed off at Trump. One rancher in CD6 wasn’t happy with the Trump administration’s policy of importing beef to help lower beef prices, Politico reported over the weekend.

Instead of embracing his ties to Trump, Ciscomani is trying to bolster his reputation as someone who will work with people from across the political spectrum.

Ciscomani has spent a lot of time attacking Mendoza for being a “radical liberal” while touting his recognition as one of the most bipartisan members of Congress.

What does bipartisanship look like in CD6, and what does it have to do with Regina Romero?

Nothing. And everything.

The Democratic mayor of Tucson has become a lightning rod in the CD6 race, even though she isn’t on the ballot. Ciscomani has repeatedly attacked Romero, an elected official representing part of his district, as a way to tie Mendoza to Tucson’s progressive politics.

But what about the bipartisanship recognition?

We looked at the methodology more than a week ago, and it doesn’t measure whether Ciscomani votes with Democrats. Instead, it largely examines whether members of the opposing party sign on to his bills — and whether he signs on to theirs.

Meanwhile, VoteHub gives Ciscomani a “Trump score” of 100%, meaning he voted in line with the Trump administration’s position on every vote the organization tracked in 2025.

That sounds less bipartisan, although Ciscomani was hardly an outlier: VoteHub found that 182 of 219 House Republicans received the same score.

We could be wrong about Ciscomani downplaying his MAGA credentials at a time when Trump’s polling numbers show that roughly one-third of Americans approve of his performance in office.

Maybe Juan is simply taking advice from another president.

Still not bad advice.

Opportunity to speak up: Parents who want to make sure Tucson Unified School District officials hear their complaints about proposed school closures can attend public meetings tomorrow at Cholla High School and again on Saturday at Catalina High School, per the Tucson Sentinel. Democratic U.S. Rep. Adelita Grijalva already made clear what she thinks about recent school closures during an interview with the Arizona Daily Star.

Speaking of starvation: Local school districts are asking voters to help them make ends meet with bond measures, like the $250 million bond that Pima County’s Joint Technical Education District put on the ballot, the Arizona Luminaria’s Shannon Conner reports. JTED officials want to expand the district’s campuses via Prop 427, which would raise local property tax rates for the next 15 years. One wrinkle in the plan is that local school districts in Nogales and Rio Rico opposed the bond plan, and now their share of the pie will be a lot smaller if the bond passes, Graham Krewinghaus reports for the Nogales International. Over at TUSD, local residents signed off on a budget override last year — the first successful override at TUSD in four decades — and now they’re paying a couple hundred dollars more each year to fund raises for teachers, hire more counselors and pay for an assortment of other initiatives, per the Star’s Sierra Blaser.

Need a scalpel, not a bazooka: Tucson City Council members could have just said “no” to the proposal to rename a park after Sal Baldenegro, instead of putting the kibosh on renaming parks, Star columnist Tim Steller writes. He was referring to the kerfuffle last week (which we wrote about) that had “decent arguments on both sides,” but ended with a moratorium that went way beyond those arguments.

Dude, your priorities are showing: The U.S. Border Patrol is sitting on a $5 billion pot of taxpayer money, and they’re planning at least three new stations in Southern Arizona, at a cost of at least $100 million each, Angela Gervasi reports for Arizona Public Media. At the same time, the federal government won’t pay to help clean up PFAS that polluted groundwater near the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, the Star’s Tony Davis reports.

The joy of transparency: The three-way race for Sierra Vista mayor kind of went off the rails when Tim Flowers, husband of candidate Carolyn Flowers, claimed his wife’s rivals had been investigated or arrested by law enforcement. But the city clerk promptly turned over public records that helped the Herald/Review clear up the situation for readers, which earned kudos from the newspaper.

The Pima County Board of Supervisors is going on a proclamation diet after its 13-item binge fest a few months ago.

It happened right around Earth Day, although no one on the board put forward a proclamation for that.

In an attempt to cut down on the political puffery, Pima County Administrator Jan Lesher is suggesting a limit of three proclamations per meeting — and no more than one from any supervisor.

If a supervisor wants to squeeze in another, they’ll need a board majority to put it on the agenda.

Here are the nine proclamations on today’s agenda and who requested them:

Under Lesher’s proposed proclamation diet, six of those would have to wait for another cheat day.

Our suggestion? Start giving out awards from your district office, supervisors.

But we don’t advise giving out the Francis Scott Key key.