Ducey says he values bipartisan support just like Sinema. No, seriously, he said that

Gov. Doug Ducey stepped forward on Thursday to praise Democratic Sen. Kyrsten Sinema for almost single-handedly consigning the Democrats’ voting rights bill to the trash heap.

This, by refusing to suspend the Senate filibuster rule that requires 60 votes to pass most legislation.

“I want to give Senator Sinema credit for standing up and protecting a Senate rule that she believes in,” Arizona’s Republican governor told reporters on Thursday. “This has existed for a long time. And this idea of getting to a majority and building consensus and bipartisan consensus is something that we’ve done on over 90% of the legislation we’ve been able to achieve at the state level. And I’m glad that she’s trying to bring people together.”

OK, who are you and what have you done with our governor?

Really? Name a major bill that was bipartisan

Ducey and the Republican-controlled Legislature routinely ram through their agenda on simple majority votes, without so much as a single Democratic vote.

School voucher expansion?

Private prisons?

Tax cuts?

Where are all those important bills in which Republicans built bipartisan consensus.

Election law “reforms?”

Immigration law "reforms"?

“This idea of getting to a majority and building consensus and bipartisan consensus,” Ducey tells us, “is something that we’ve done on over 90% of the legislation we’ve been able to achieve at the state level.”

Oh sure, when you’re creating new state license plates or passing administrative changes or paying tribute to the Navajo CodeTalkers. There has been the occasional bill of note with significant bipartisan support. But for seven years that’s been the exception, never the rule.

This is a governor who appointed precisely zero Democrats to the Arizona Commission on Appellate Court Appointments, the panel that screens and recommends applicants for the Court of Appeals, the Supreme Court and the vitally important Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission, which recently redrew the state's congressional and legislative districts.

Both sides worked together. Not anymore

Abortion restrictions?

Gun protections?

Budget priorities?

It wasn’t always this way.

Once upon a time, Arizona had a Democratic governor (Bruce Babbitt) and a Republican Legislature. They were forced to work together, but they were also people who saw each other as duly-elected representatives of the state who, as such, deserved a seat at the bargaining table.

They got some good things done for the state: a landmark groundwater management bill that allowed Arizona to grow and prosper, a health care plan for the poor that became a national model.

Today, we are a state that is roughly a third Republican, a third Democratic and a third independent. Yet Democrats could disappear from the state Capitol and I’m not sure Republicans wouldn’t even notice.

Critical race theory?

A ban on vaccine mandates?

A ban on mask mandates?

Anyone want to place a bet on how much “bipartisan consensus” we can expect to see Ducey demand this year?

Reach Roberts at laurie.roberts@arizonarepublic.com. Follow her on Twitter at @LaurieRoberts.

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Gov. Doug Ducey values bipartisanship like Sinema? Who's he kidding?