A Republican lawmaker from Chandler quietly rewrote one of his bills last month — creating a potential legal escape hatch for Project Blue’s developers as they face a grassroots referendum backed by thousands of Marana residents.
Republican Rep. Jeff Weninger’s House Bill 2873 could reach Gov. Katie Hobbs’ desk as early as this week, and seems to have one clear beneficiary: Beale Infrastructure.
Beale is actively trying to kill two referendums against its proposed data center in Marana. The referendums would let voters decide whether a subsidiary of Blue Owl Capital can build data centers on separate parcels for a planned 600-acre campus near the Pinal Air Park.
The developers want to build on these two plots of land near Pinal Air Park.
Did we say two referendums? We did — one for each parcel.
For now, the petitions — signed by more than 2,800 Marana residents — are tied up in court.
But here’s where things get messy: Arizonans for Responsible Development, a Marana-based political action committee sponsored by the labor-affiliated group Worker Power, sent a letter to the town in mid-February. In it, the group asked the town to withdraw the petitions it had submitted just two weeks earlier.
“The Committee retracts the petitions signatures it submitted in support of both of these measures and no longer supports placing these measures on the ballot,” wrote James Barton, an attorney for Arizonans for Responsible Development.
The town refused the request, saying it lacked the authority to toss voters’ signatures on the referendums simply because the group asked.
But Weninger’s bill would allow the referendum backers to withdraw their referendum, clearing the way for the Marana data center.
Local activists believe labor unions may have pushed Arizonans for Responsible Development/Public Power to pull the plug on the referendum — concerned that voters could reject the data center and take union jobs down with it.
And the referendum is likely the most direct legal path to stopping the data centers. Zoning decisions are one of the few local actions that can be challenged by voters this way.
A portion of the 600 acres being eyed for data centers is currently being used for agriculture.
Weninger’s rewritten bill would allow a person or organization that files a city or town referendum petition to withdraw it at any time before it qualifies for the ballot — basically giving sponsors a way to pull the plug midstream.
On paper, there isn’t a smoking gun tying Weninger’s bill to Beale or the town of Marana.
But the fact that the bill contains an emergency clause that works retroactively is a pretty strong indicator that it’s about protecting Beale’s investment in Marana. As far as we know, the referendum against the proposed Marana data center is the only referendum that hasn’t yet qualified for the ballot that could be withdrawn immediately under the retroactivity clause.
In the Senate Regulatory Affairs and Government Efficiency committee hearing last month, Weninger said the bill is intended to allow referendum sponsors to withdraw petitions if circumstances change.
“This bill just, to me, this is just a common sense governance thing,” Weninger said. “If somebody... files a referendum with the city, people keep talking, people negotiate, or people’s feelings change, then why shouldn’t that organization be able for that person to pull that referendum back and say, ‘Okay, we don’t need it now.’”
The bill passed out of committee unanimously. Representatives from seven labor unions and four Valley-based chambers of commerce supported the striker amendment, which had been written only a few days earlier.
At its core, Weninger’s bill sets up a collision between a $400 million development and a grassroots referendum campaign — one with the reach to potentially influence state law, the other built on thousands of signatures from Marana residents.
And with the bill retroactive to Jan. 1, 2026, it could allow Arizonans for Responsible Development to pull the plug on the twin referendums — without needing support from a judge or the Town of Marana.
Meanwhile, Fremont Peak Properties, a subsidiary of Beale Infrastructure, is asking a judge to take the referendums off the ballot.
And there’s another lawsuit from local activists to force the town to let the referendums onto the ballot.
A day after the town received the letter from Arizonans for Responsible Development to kill the referendum, a staff review of the petitions found they didn’t have the proper legal description on their petitions to qualify for the ballot. Officials subsequently stopped reviewing signatures.
Developers of the data centers gave us Project Blue 1.0 vibes when we read their presentation to the Marana Town Council last January.
Activists used a legal description of the parcels they received from the town clerk’s office, but the town quietly updated the legal description and did not inform local activists of the change. The town does not dispute these claims.
Jackie McGuire, one of the plaintiffs suing to keep the referendums on the ballot, is suspicious of the legislation, particularly the retroactive clause.
“This is bullshit,” she said. “I don’t think the senators knew much about this.”
She said most legislators had no idea what they were voting for, noting the original bill that passed through the House and Senate was related to sealed bids for state contracts — not referendums — and Weninger presented the idea as if it was a hypothetical, not a retroactive piece of legislation for a specific situation far outside his district.
McGuire is also running for a seat on the Marana Town Council.
As for Fremont suing the town, McGuire said the lawsuit should be tossed.
“There is no standing, they are not a voter and they are not a property owner,” she said.
Meanwhile, supporters and potential beneficiaries of the bill aren’t talking.
A spokesperson for Beale declined to comment.
The town of Marana told the Tucson Agenda that it has no comment on Weninger’s bill and does not comment on active litigation.
Weninger did not respond to a request for comment on his bill.
For now, the decision on whether Marana residents can vote on data centers may come down to the stroke of a pen — whether that’s from Hobbs or a Pima County Superior Court judge.
There are four open seats on the Marana Town Council this year, and three of the eight candidates are being challenged in Pima County Superior Court this week.
Locals argue that Robert Contreras, Jeff Gray and Herb Kai didn’t collect enough valid signatures to qualify for the ballot or had legal issues with their filing paperwork.
Five other candidates already qualified for the ballot: Susan Ritz, Julie Prince, Jackie McGuire, John Officer and Teri Murphy.
There is also a race for Marana mayor between incumbent Jon Post and challenger Greg Johnsen.
Quiet as a mouse: Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr slipped in and out of several events in Arizona last week, including a roundtable in Marana, while low-key avoiding the spotlight and questions about the recent measles outbreak, Arizona Daily Star columnist Tim Steller writes.1 Speaking of not taking hard questions, Steller also pointed out that Republican U.S. Rep. Juan Ciscomani was able to do an entire — and rare — interview with KVOI without having to answer questions about President Donald Trump threatening to wipe out an entire civilization.
Nope: Democratic U.S. Rep. Adelita Grijalva retracted her endorsement of U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell in his run for California governor after he was accused of sexually assaulting a former staffer. Grijalva called the allegations “deeply disturbing and disqualifying.” Democratic U.S. Sen. Ruben Gallego defended Swalwell, who is a longtime friend of his, when the accusations first surfaced, but Gallego eventually withdrew his endorsement, per the Republic’s Ronald J. Hansen. Swalwell suspended his campaign on Sunday, but he didn’t say anything about whether he planned to resign from Congress.
Unearthing history: Railroad construction in Nogales, Sonora, unearthed dozens of artifacts like cremation vessels, shell ornaments, houses and human remains that are linked to the Hohokam and Trincheras cultures, Mia Kortright reports for the Tucson Sentinel. Now, members of the Tohono O’odham Nation are looking for ways to retrieve those items and rebury the human remains, which belonged to their ancestors.
Tie a yellow ribbon: Some Tucsonans are wearing yellow ribbon pins to bring hope to the Nancy Guthrie case, which is steadily fading from the public conversation, the Republic’s Sarah Lapidus reports. Guthrie went missing more than two months ago, and the news vans that swamped her street are gone and headlines are less frequent. And Tucsonans told Lapidus many people are now focused on other stories, like Iran or the stock market.
There’s always too much news coming at you every day. That’s what we’re here for. Support local journalism and it’ll support you right back.
Not just late fees: In an op-ed in the Star, Rocque Perez explained why he sued state Rep. Alma Hernandez, who Perez is trying to unseat this year. Perez says the basis of his lawsuit — that Hernandez should be disqualified from the ballot because she filed campaign finance reports late and owes thousands of dollars in fines — is about more than a filing dispute. It’s about the role of money and influence in politics. The duo heads to court today.
“Over time, my opponent’s fundraising has increasingly come from beyond Tucson and beyond Arizona, with substantial support from PACs, lobbying networks, utilities, developers, insurance and pharmaceutical interests, political insiders, and even billionaires from across the country,” Perez writes.
Here are the top events this week for those who want a front-row seat to local politics.
The Democrats of Greater Tucson meet virtually today at noon. The today’s guest speaker in Legislative District 21 candidate Miranda Lopez. (Register here)
The Tucson Unified School District Government Board will meet on Tuesday at 6 p.m. at 5145 E. 5th Street. (Here’s the agenda and live stream)
The Pima County Republican Club meets on Tuesdays at 11:30 a.m. at The Kettle just west of I-10 on 22nd St.
Did we miss an event? Email Joe to get it on our radar.
Former Tucson City Councilman Rodney Glassman’s political career somehow keeps trucking along, even after 16 years of losing elections.
While Glassman was a guest on AZFamily’s “Politics Unplugged” with Dennis Welch this weekend, Welch pointed out that after Glassman left the Tucson City Council, he lost races for U.S. Senate and Arizona Democratic Party chair.
Then he switched to the Republican Party, and continued losing races — including for Arizona Corporation Commission, Maricopa County Assessor and Arizona Attorney General.
Senate President Warren Petersen, Glassman’s opponent for the GOP nomination for Arizona Attorney General this year, was happy to correct Welch’s count.
Interestingly, the prediction markets don’t think Glassman’s losing streak will continue.
Bettors on Kalshi give him a 70% chance of winning the Republican nomination in the attorney general race, nearly twice as high as Petersen’s odds.
1 Fun fact, we mentioned last Monday that RFK Jr. was in Arizona — thanks to a reader who spotted him on a plane to Phoenix last week.