Disgraced former lawmaker Leezah Sun’s hopes of returning to the state Capitol were dashed Tuesday, as she was trounced by fellow Democrat Eva Diaz in a West Valley legislative race.
Diaz, the incumbent in the race, handily defeated Sun in Tuesday’s primary, sweeping up nearly three times the number of votes as her opponent in a scathing rebuke of the disgraced former lawmaker.
Initial reporting showed Diaz with a hefty 53% lead over Sun. A difference of nearly 4,000 votes separated the two.
Diaz was first elected to the Arizona legislature in 2022, after mounting a successful write-in campaign following the withdrawal of Diego Espinoza, the only Democratic candidate running to represent Legislative District 22, which spans parts of Goodyear, Avondale and Tolleson. Since then, the first-term lawmaker has made immigrant advocacy, public education and health care key parts of her political focus. The district Diaz represents is majority Hispanic, and is solidly Democratic.
Sun, meanwhile, was elected to the Arizona House of Representatives for the same district in 2022. In the freshman lawmaker’s first year of serving in the state legislature, Democratic Party leaders filed an ethics complaint against her, alarmed by reports that she had weaponized her office to influence the outcome of a friend’s child custody arrangement, intimidated a school superintendent and threatened kill a Tolleson city lobbyist by throwing her off a hotel balcony.
After a monthslong investigation and two separate hearings — during neither of which Sun apologized or admitted guilt — the House Ethics Committee concluded that the freshman lawmaker was guilty of violating the legislature’s rule against disorderly conduct. Facing certain expulsion, Sun resigned shortly before the start of the floor session during which Democratic and Republican lawmakers were expected to vote her out of office.
Undeterred by the mark on her political reputation, Sun forged ahead with her campaign to represent west Phoenix in the state Senate and voters in her district responded with a stinging rebuke.
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