Accompanying Rep. Teresa Martinez through the hallways of the Arizona State Capitol feels a lot like walking through Copacabana with Ray Liotta in Goodfellas. 

She’s rattling off what’s behind the doors of an underground passageway leading into the Senate chambers. That one’s the back entrance to a committee room, she says. She’s rifling through her to-do list — Oh! She had to write that speech today. 

And in between pointing out her favorite photos, like a 1917 monochrome print of the Capitol, are the constant salutations and “Did you get my memo?” and handshakes and times hallways become impromptu meeting rooms to quiz staffers about what’s on the agenda or whether they had a slice of king cake yet. 

How a walk so brief could be so chaotic is beyond me. As is how the sophomore representative for Maricopa has the energy for all of it every day.  

“It’s the Coke Zero,” she insists. We take a beat in her office, and she points to a mini fridge filled with soda cans before we leave for the House floor. 

“I’m going to take you the long way up,” Martinez says.  

But before we make it off the elevator, she’s introducing me to Rep. Anna Abeytia, a West Phoenix Democrat who you might not imagine rolling with the likes of Martinez.  

“You know all those emails on the 347? She’s been covering that,” Martinez tells her colleague. 

“Is that your district? I actually had no idea of that highway until I got here. I was like, ‘What is going on?’” Abeytia says. “I was googling it, wondering where is this highway even at?” 

The emails about State Route 347 were a conversation on repeat until we caught up with Maricopa’s other state representative, Chris Lopez, in the minutes before members assembled for a third reading of bills. One of his first pieces of legislation is up for a vote today, House Bill 2557, which would bring an additional $16.2 million to help fund widening the cursed highway.  

“That’s how important those emails are; everyone knows about it now,” Martinez says.  

“Just this morning there was another accident, so I shared with all the members the [InMaricopa.com] article and headline,” Lopez adds.  

They move to the floor, and I head to the gallery to watch the lawmakers vote mostly in silence for nearly two hours. Now, it’s Lopez’s turn. 

Lopez, who was sworn into office for the first time in January — after ousting the only Democrat in Legislative District 16 — talks about the statistics, Martinez mentions all the emails and Rep. Quantá Crews (D-Phoenix) testifies about her own travels on SR 347.  

It is truly a bipartisan affair. 

We watch the screen light up green for a unanimous vote in favor of the funding and LD16 seatmate Sen. T.J. Shope sends a text message from a Committee on Natural Resources meeting. 

Pling! Martinez’s cellular lights up. Shope is celebrating the legislative victory. 

A loud, mad, curly-haired Virgo Latina 

At the same time Republicans were winning a trifecta in the federal government in November, members of that party were putting together a trifecta of their own in Maricopa’s district. 

Lopez, Martinez and Shope ran on a ticket together, a cohesive red-wave team that proved impossible for the Democrats to topple in the 2024 general election.  

Shope was leading challenger Stacey Seaman by 12% on election night. Her father, Rep. Keith Seaman (D-Casa Grande), narrowly lost re-election by 3 points to newcomer Lopez.  

And since then, they’ve created a little Pinal County dream team. Shope said the trio was “a breath of fresh air,” while Lopez likened it to a sibling relationship.  

“We communicate a lot; there’s a lot of texting. It feels a lot like being a younger brother,” Lopez said. “I couldn’t ask for better mentors.” 

Martinez accepted that role, saying, “Sometimes you need somebody, a loud, mad, curly-haired, Virgo Latina yelling at somebody as to why in the world things aren’t done yet.” 

With 13 years under his belt, Shope accepted his role as the quiet older brother with a robust middle child and a younger brother just learning his role in the process.  

“I’m comfortable with the fact that Teresa is a great person to rally the troops, so to speak,” he said, “because it’s authentic. If I were to do something like that, it just comes off as inauthentic because it’s just not my personality, not my style. The way I operate — as an institutionalist and a lover of the process — is working, and Chris is going to find his style as well.” 

Keith Seaman did not caucus with Republicans. Strategists during the election cycle said that was detrimental to Seaman, the lone Democrat in a reliably red, largely rural district. 

“Keith is a very nice man, and he tried super hard,” Martinez said. “But I couldn’t help Keith with his bills … I couldn’t help him with his priorities because we had different priorities.” 

Shope shared similar views.  

“I don’t have anything negative to say personally of Keith. We just had ideological differences to the extent that we weren’t able to help each other,” he said. 

It could have been his voting record — or the fact that Seaman failed to pass a single bill during his two years in the House, something the lawmakers were diplomatic enough not to broach in interviews. 

Going against the grain 

The passage of HB 2557 in the House Appropriations Committee is a crucial step toward the estimated $143 million needed to widen the Pinal County portion of State Route 347. But it didn’t pass by unanimous verdict. 

The five abstentions came from House Democrats, who all voted “present” as opposed to “yea” or “nay.” All except for Rep. Kevin Volk, the only Democrat who crossed the aisle to support the measure. 

It’s not the first time he’s done such a thing.  

The freshman lawmaker from the traditionally conservative District 17 in Tucson is a political newbie and has been getting skewered by the Left for his legislative choices recently. But he’s doing the opposite of Keith Seaman’s failed red-district-Dem playbook. 

Volk in February voted with Republicans in favor of HB 2606, which appropriated $50 million for the Arizona Department of Public Safety to “deter and apprehend” unlawful border crossers. It was a move that led to immigrants’ rights activists calling him a sellout and racist. 

His reason? It’s what his constituents wanted. And sitting on the House Appropriations Committee listening to statistics about Maricopa’s traffic, the fatalities, the impacts on home and work lives — it sounded familiar.  

“It reminds me of some of the fastest growing areas in my district, particularly the Marana area,” Volk told InMaricopa.  

A 2024 data study listed Marana as the No. 33 fastest growing city in the country. Maricopa came in seventh place on the same list. And while he and his constituents may not be directly impacted by commuting on SR 347, Volk said voting in favor of the bill was part of the “greater good.” 

“While we are elected to represent our district and we’re directly answerable to the constituents of our legislative districts, our charge is to serve the greater good of the State of Arizona. That includes all folks in Arizona,” he said. 

However, it’s also likely the votes — along with his infamous bill making “howdy” the official legal greeting in Arizona — were attempts to build rapport as a lonely Democrat in MAGA country.  

“I am the type of person — and I made this commitment to my voters — that I will always work together with anyone in order to get the best outcomes for districts in our state,” Volk said. “My colleagues, they all bring different experiences and different perspectives to the legislature.” 

Volk’s colleagues are Rep. Rachel Jones and Sen. Justine Wadsack, two extremely far-right Tucson Republicans who are part of the Arizona Freedom Caucus.  

Both have espoused unfounded conspiracy theories related to the 2020 election and the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. Jones last year introduced legislation that would have declared Donald Trump the 2024 presidential election winner even if Kamala Harris won the Electoral College.  

The Dem and the MAGA who said no to fixing SR 347 

Senate Bill 1617, introduced by Shope, requests the $49 million already allocated for the Riggs Road overpass on State Route 347 be made available this year. 

Of the 10 members of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Sen. Lauren Kuby (D-Tempe) was the lone “nay” vote Feb. 18 despite telling at least one Maricopa official and SR 347 advocates that she would support the bill. 

During the vote, she explained that she was concerned if the overpass funding were to “leapfrog ahead,” the Arizona Department of Transportation could push back other infrastructure projects already slated for its five-year plan. Presumably, projects in her district. 

She reiterated that point in an interview with InMaricopa a few days later and chalked her vote, which shocked Maricopans, up to “misinformation.” 

“I had some misinformation, frankly, that this was going to basically bump other projects, and it was going to leapfrog over another project that might have had a higher priority,” Kuby said in the interview. “Sen. [Vince] Leach (R-Saddlebrooke) talked to me afterwards and I got verification from ADOT, so that made me feel more comfortable.” 

When the bill went through the Senate for a third reading, Kuby fell in line and voted in support of it.  

“Knowing the dangers of the intersection and that it’s one of the worst in the Southwest, it has to be a priority,” she said. 

In a twist, the lone “nay” during that Feb. 27 vote came from Sen. Jake Hoffman (R-Queen Creek). He founded the Arizona Freedom Caucus and refers to himself as a “persecuted Trump elector” on the social media platform X.  

Hoffman waffled in his support of the Riggs Road overpass project when former State Rep. Bret Roberts, a Maricopa Republican, introduced the original bill to fund the project in 2021. 

Hoffman voted for the bill during a February committee hearing, but he changed his mind just over a week later. It turned out Hoffman was chief among a group of Republicans who deemed the bill “pork” and went “against their conservative fiscal beliefs.” It was among a stack of projects the group believed “must go.” 

Just another day at the office 

Martinez’s politics may be ruby red, but her office is royal blue. That’s where we end our day. 

An hour has passed since Lopez’s first-ever bill, which would allocate over $16 million to widen SR 347, passed with unanimous support. It marked a dramatic reversal from the House Committee on Appropriations’ vote just two weeks earlier. The two representatives are energized. 

“It was a bit like passing a kidney stone,” Lopez laughs. “Actually, it was very fulfilling. I can’t tell you I enjoyed all that driving after the election to all the orientations and trainings, but when it was go time, I was so glad. It’s very fulfilling because we are making decisions for our constituents and for the entire state.” 

Martinez commended the bipartisan support, saying, “There are some bills that [Democrats] can say, ‘This is a good bill,’ and then we work together.” 

Now, only the budget and ADOT’s bureaucracy stand in the way. 

This is one of them. 

“They don’t see the road as crucial or important. They finally understand now, but they literally needed to be coerced into doing their job,” she said.  

Shope said he hopes the momentum continues through the session, to push the governor’s office to understand the urgency. 

“When you’re a legislator who has one of the most dangerous intersections in the western half of the country in your district, it’s embarrassing,” he said. “I know the patience is wearing thin … but I hope the people know they have a good team here making sure their voice, the Maricopa voice, is definitely being heard at the Capitol.”