Phoenix, AZ – Nine people were taken into Phoenix Police Department custody after participating in a peaceful civil disobedience outside of Attorney General Brnovich’s office Thursday morning as part of a rally and picket line protesting his relentless attacks on Arizonans’ voting rights.

“We are telling Mark Brnovich, our Attorney General, that we will not just sit by and watch as our rights are stripped away. We deserve real national voting rights legislation and we will do whatever it takes to make that happen,” said Joshua Wells, a community organizer.

On July 1, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a decision in support of Brnovich’s defense of two restrictive voting laws. The decision gutted Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, undermining historic protections against racial discrimination in elections. Additionally, the Arizona state legislature passed a flurry of anti-voter measures at the tail end of the session that concluded last week. One of those bills requires the Secretary of State to provide voter information, including’ date of birth and part of their Social Security number, to a third-party private vendor who could then remove them from the voter rolls.

At the same time, the Arizona legislature took the unprecedented move of removing powers from the Secretary of State and conferring them on the Arizona Attorney General, a move that coincides with the end of Secretary Katie Hobbs’ term. Attorney General Brnovich announced his intention to run for U. S. Senate in 2022 on June 10.

“We have brave freedom fighters here today who are going to demand justice from our Attorney General and demand that he stop attacking the freedom to vote. When you have a complicit governor, a complicit attorney general, [and a] complicit majority-Republican legislature, there’s only so much we can do here today,” said State Representative Athena Salman, addressing the crowd, “We need Senator Kyrsten Sinema and Senator Mark Kelly and President Joe Biden to stand up. We delivered for them and now they have to deliver for us. The number one thing, the foundation of our democracy, is protecting our freedom to vote.

More than 75 attended the action that highlighted the need for the For the People Act – federal voting rights legislation – to protect against the 350+ voter suppression bills introduced across 47 states since January 2021.

The same coalition recently completed a weeklong freedom ride to Washington D.C for voting rights.