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Per-judge retention calls inside

This guide covers 27 of the 82 judges on Arizona's official 2026 retention slate: the one Supreme Court justice every Arizona voter will see, the 14 Court of Appeals judges (eight in Division I, six in Division II), and the Superior Court judges of Pima County (10) and Coconino County (2), whose tables ride in this guide. The 49 Maricopa County Superior Court judges and the 6 Pinal County Superior Court judges have their own guides in this series. Every judge named here appears exactly once across the three guides. The election is November 3, 2026; early voting is already open.

How retention works — read this first

Arizona does not elect these judges in contested races. Under the merit-selection system Arizona voters adopted in 1974, a nonpartisan nominating commission screens applicants and sends the governor a list of at least three qualified names, and the governor appoints. Every appointed judge then faces the voters in a retention election — an uncontested, nonpartisan, yes-or-no question asked judge by judge: shall this judge be retained in office? A judge first stands for retention after an initial two-year term; after that, Supreme Court justices and Court of Appeals judges stand every six years and trial-court (Superior Court) judges every four years. A majority of YES votes retains the judge for a new term. A majority of NO votes removes the judge: the seat becomes vacant when the term expires and is filled by the governor from a nominating commission's list — a NO vote does not elect any named replacement. (Arizona Commission on Judicial Performance Review FAQ; azcentral, October 22, 2026.)

The performance evidence voters are given comes from the Arizona Commission on Judicial Performance Review (JPR). The commission — 34 members appointed by the Arizona Supreme Court, a majority of them public members who are neither judges nor attorneys — surveys the attorneys, jurors, litigants, witnesses, court staff and fellow judges who have seen each judge work, takes public comment, and considers information from the Commission on Judicial Conduct. It grades judges against five standards: command of the law, impartiality, clarity of communication, judicial temperament and professionalism, and administrative skill and work ethic. It then votes, judge by judge, on whether the judge Meets Judicial Performance Standards or Does Not Meet them, and publishes that vote in the Secretary of State's publicity pamphlet and at azjudges.info. (JPR FAQ.)

For 2026 the commission's verdict was uniform: every judge on the official slate — all 82 names in these three guides — was found to Meet Judicial Performance Standards. No judge on the slate carries a JPR failure or a recorded JPR dissent in the official table. (JPR, 2026 Judicial Performance Reports; azcentral, September 29, 2026.)

The honest gap in this guide: the per-judge survey percentages behind those votes sit behind individual report links at azjudges.info and in the publicity pamphlet, and they are not reproduced here. The commission's Meets-Standards vote is what this guide prices. Where an advocacy guide's reading of a judge's percentages is part of a story below, we say so, name the guide, and grade it as advocacy — we do not present its reading as the commission's finding.

How to use the tables: "Appointed by" names the governor who appointed the judge, per the JPR roster research file; for judges first elected before their county entered merit selection, the table says so instead. Judges who took the bench in 2023 straddle the Ducey–Hobbs transition; their appointing governors are taken from Civic Engagement Beyond Voting's 2026 Gavel Watch, which lists an appointing governor for every judge, and are printed here as sourced to that report.

Arizona Supreme Court — 1 justice (on every Arizona ballot)

| Judge | Court/Division | On the bench since | Appointed by | JPR vote | Our call | |---|---|---|---|---|---| | John R. Lopez IV | Arizona Supreme Court — Vice Chief Justice | 2017 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain |

Arizona Court of Appeals, Division I — 8 judges

| Judge | Court/Division | On the bench since | Appointed by | JPR vote | Our call | |---|---|---|---|---|---| | Michael S. Catlett | Arizona Court of Appeals, Division I | 2023 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Anni Hill Foster | Arizona Court of Appeals, Division I | 2023 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Randall M. Howe | Arizona Court of Appeals, Division I | 2012 | Jan Brewer | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Andrew M. Jacobs | Arizona Court of Appeals, Division I | 2023 | Katie Hobbs | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Daniel J. Kiley | Arizona Court of Appeals, Division I | 2023 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | James B. Morse Jr. | Arizona Court of Appeals, Division I | 2017 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Jennifer M. Perkins | Arizona Court of Appeals, Division I | 2017 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | David Weinzweig | Arizona Court of Appeals, Division I | 2018 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain |

Arizona Court of Appeals, Division II — 6 judges

| Judge | Court/Division | On the bench since | Appointed by | JPR vote | Our call | |---|---|---|---|---|---| | Sean Brearcliffe | Arizona Court of Appeals, Division II | 2017 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Karl C. Eppich | Arizona Court of Appeals, Division II | 2017 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Lacey Stover Gard | Arizona Court of Appeals, Division II | 2023 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Michael F. Kelly | Arizona Court of Appeals, Division II | 2023 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Christopher J. O'Neil | Arizona Court of Appeals, Division II | 2023 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Jeffrey L. Sklar | Arizona Court of Appeals, Division II | 2022 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain |

Pima County Superior Court — 10 judges

| Judge | Court/Division | On the bench since | Appointed by | JPR vote | Our call | |---|---|---|---|---|---| | Sandra M. Bensley | Pima County Superior Court — Other | 2024 | Katie Hobbs | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Jeffrey T. Bergin | Pima County Superior Court — Civil | 2011 | Jan Brewer | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Janet C. Bostwick | Pima County Superior Court — Juvenile | 2016 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Randi L. Burnett | Pima County Superior Court — Family | 2023 | Katie Hobbs | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | J. Alan Goodwin | Pima County Superior Court — Criminal | 2020 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Cynthia Kuhn | Pima County Superior Court — Civil | 2016 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Danelle Liwski | Pima County Superior Court — Criminal | 2011 | Jan Brewer | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Kathleen A. Quigley | Pima County Superior Court — Juvenile | 2012 | Jan Brewer | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Laurie B. San Angelo | Pima County Superior Court — Juvenile | 2020 | Doug Ducey | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Catherine M. Woods | Pima County Superior Court — Family | 2011 | Jan Brewer | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain |

Coconino County Superior Court — 2 judges

| Judge | Court/Division | On the bench since | Appointed by | JPR vote | Our call | |---|---|---|---|---|---| | Ted S. Reed | Coconino County Superior Court — Criminal | 2019 | Elected 2018 — no appointing governor | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain | | Joshua C. Steinlage | Coconino County Superior Court — Criminal | 2024 | Katie Hobbs | Meets Judicial Performance Standards | Retain |

Per-judge notes — what the campaigns say, and what the record shows

Most of the 27 judges above have no individual file beyond the JPR's Meets vote, and this guide invents none. The exceptions are the judges the organized campaigns — on both sides — have singled out. Each item below is printed with its source and graded on its evidence.

Justice John R. Lopez IV (Supreme Court) — targeted by Gavel Watch; the case is jurisprudence, not conduct. Civic Engagement Beyond Voting's 2026 Gavel Watch — an advocacy report that states openly that it screens judges for ideological bias and Federalist Society affiliation — recommends Do Not Retain, as it did in 2020. Its lead example is Lopez's April 2024 majority opinion in Planned Parenthood v. Mayes, which held that the 1864 territorial abortion ban took precedence over the legislature's 2022 15-week law; Arizona voters then wrote abortion rights into the state constitution in November 2024 with 61.6% of the vote (Gavel Watch's figure). The report also cites his opinion rejecting a referendum challenge to Governor Ducey's flat tax, juvenile-sentencing and search-warrant decisions he joined, the 2019 Brush & Nib decision, his Federalist Society chapter board activity, and a 2020 Arizona Free Enterprise Club endorsement. Every item on that list is a ruling or an affiliation. None of it is misconduct, discipline, or a performance failure — and the JPR survey summary Gavel Watch itself reprints shows Lopez at 100% in every category, on a small sample of 26 respondents. An independent legal commentator who worked through the opinions reached the same practical conclusion we do: based on the JPR's assessment and a legal review of his opinions, "it would be very difficult to make a case for removal" (AZ Law, October 20, 2026). Voters who want a different jurisprudence on the court have a legitimate argument to make at this ballot line — but it is a political argument, not the performance case our Vote NO rule requires. Retain.

Judge Anni Hill Foster (Division I) — targeted for her pre-bench career. Gavel Watch recommends Do Not Retain because, before her appointment, Foster served as Governor Ducey's general counsel (2017–2022) and in Republican attorneys-general and public-safety posts — preparing SB1070 implementation, signing a Dobbs amicus brief, and litigating against the Biden administration — alongside Federalist Society and Republican National Lawyers Association activity. That is a record as a partisan government lawyer, made before she took the bench in 2023. It documents no conduct as a judge, and the commission that reviewed her judicial performance voted Meets. A lawyer's client list before appointment is not a judicial-performance record. Retain.

Judge Jennifer M. Perkins (Division I) — targeted for affiliation and one contested survey reading. Gavel Watch recommends Do Not Retain, citing her Federalist Society executive-committee role and its reading of her JPR attorney surveys — a 34% combined "Poor" + "Unsatisfactory" share in Legal Ability, per Gavel Watch's reading of her individual report. Those percentages are the advocacy report's reading of data this guide does not reproduce (see the honest gap above); the commission that reviewed the full data voted Meets. Affiliation plus a contested reading of survey data does not meet our bar for a Vote NO. Retain.

Judge David Weinzweig (Division I) — targeted for pre-bench advocacy. Gavel Watch carries forward its 2020 Do Not Retain recommendation, based on positions he argued as an assistant attorney general — defending midazolam executions and a 2015 abortion law — plus small-sample survey readings it flags itself as based on very few respondents. Arguing the state's position was his job as a government litigator; it is not a record of his judging since 2018, which the JPR grades Meets. Retain.

Judge Sean Brearcliffe (Division II) — the closest thing to a conduct item in this guide, and it still does not carry a NO. Gavel Watch carries forward a 2020 Do Not Retain recommendation built on a 2015 superior-court ruling (that a gay couple could not divorce because, in his view, they could not have married — with language disclaiming any obligation to follow federal precedent), on donations he made to Republican candidates while on the bench in 2020 and 2022, and on its reading of his survey percentages. The donations are a fact about the campaign, printed here so voters can price them; political giving by a retention judge is not, by itself, a documented performance failure or a conduct-commission finding, and no discipline is reported by any source in this research. The commission voted Meets in 2026. Retain.

Judges Sandra M. Bensley and Randi L. Burnett (Pima) — a PAC says reject both, and publishes no reason. The Freedom Club PAC — the campaign arm of the conservative Arizona Free Enterprise Club — urges voters to reject Bensley and Burnett and, as the Tucson Agenda reported on October 20, 2026, "didn't explain its rationale." Both judges are appointees of Governor Katie Hobbs. Being appointed by a Democratic governor is not a performance record, and a no-reason removal campaign is not evidence. Both judges carry Meets votes. Retain both.

Judge J. Alan Goodwin (Pima) — a removal campaign built partly on an error. Two liberal voter guides (Arizona Judge Watch and the State + Local Election Alliance) urged Goodwin's removal over sentences he imposed, most prominently a one-year jail sentence for a former sheriff's sergeant convicted by a jury in a sexual-assault case. The Tucson Agenda's October 20 fact-check found the guides' central claim wrong: Arizona Judge Watch said Goodwin "found him not guilty of sexual assault" — in fact a jury acquitted on that charge and convicted on lesser charges, and the sentence the guides attack was for the convictions the jury returned. The Agenda also documented context the guides omitted in a second case (the county attorney's office had lost contact with the victim, weakening the prosecution). A sentencing decision within a judge's discretion, attacked through a factual error, is not a sourced basis for removal. Goodwin also posted the strongest JPR survey showing of any Pima judge, per the same Agenda reporting. Retain.

Judge Catherine M. Woods (Pima) — a real JPR failure, in 2014. Woods is one of the few judges in Arizona history the JPR has voted against: in 2014 the commission voted 22–7 to recommend against retaining her (Tucson Agenda, October 20, 2026). Voters retained her anyway, and she has met the commission's standards in the cycles since, including a Meets vote in 2026. A twelve-year-old failure followed by repeated Meets votes is history a voter should know — it is printed here — but it is not a current basis for a Vote NO under a rule that prices the present record. Retain.

Judge Ted S. Reed (Coconino) — an elected judge on a retention ballot. Reed's table entry corrects a natural assumption: he has no appointing governor. Coconino County voters adopted merit selection in 2018; Reed was elected to the bench that year (after service as a judge pro tempore) and now stands for retention like an appointee, retained in 2022 with 77%. No adverse file on Reed appears in this research. Retain.

The remaining advocacy flags on Pima judges — Judge Jeffrey T. Bergin's opposition to a county sentencing-data initiative, Judge Cynthia Kuhn's ballot-access ruling, Judge Janet C. Bostwick's past work as Raytheon in-house counsel, prosecutorial backgrounds for Judges Danelle Liwski and Laurie B. San Angelo (all as catalogued by the Tucson Agenda, October 20, 2026) — are background and single-ruling items. None documents misconduct, discipline, or a JPR failure, and none changes a call.

OUR CALL

Our rule for retention is deliberately narrow, and it is the same rule we apply to every candidate in this coverage: a flaw must be proven — demonstrated in service or in documented conduct — before it costs anyone our support. Applied here: we call Retain for every judge whose JPR vote is Meets Judicial Performance Standards and against whom no sourced adverse record exists. A Vote NO call from this page requires a sourced basis printed in the guide — a JPR dissent or failure, documented misconduct, or a corroborated ruling pattern that shows a judge cannot do the job. Disagreement with a judge's rulings, dislike of the governor who appointed the judge, and a judge's pre-bench career as a partisan lawyer are not performance failures, and we do not price them as ones.

Applied to these 27 judges: Retain — all 27, no exceptions. Every judge in this guide carries a JPR vote of Meets Judicial Performance Standards. Our research surfaced no JPR dissent or failure on any 2026 judge in this guide, no documented judicial-conduct discipline, and no corroborated misconduct record against any of them. The organized removal campaigns that do exist — Gavel Watch's four appellate targets, the Freedom Club PAC's two Pima targets, the liberal guides' Pima targets — are printed above with their stated bases, and each basis, examined on its evidence, is a jurisprudence dispute, a pre-bench career, an appointing governor, or in one case a factual error. That is the honest call on this record: retain across the board. We do not manufacture a controversy the record does not contain, and the files that do exist are printed above, not hidden.

For the complete Election 2026 breakdown — every race, claim by claim — see the full coverage on our website.

Vote early. Research your candidates. Choose the best moderates, whatever their party — no extremism from either side. And encourage your friends and family to do the same.

Sources

Election result — November 4, 2026

Result pending. No verified call (Associated Press or official) as of November 4, 2026. This page will be updated when the race is called or certified. The original article above is unchanged.

AI-assisted article — but the sources are human, and the facts are very real.

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