“We’ve left the state better than we found it,” he said in an interview, asked about his tenure.
As Gov. Doug Ducey prepares to transfer power to Democratic successor Gov.-elect Katie Hobbs, The Republic revisits his two terms in office.
By Stacey Barchenger||The Arizona Republic
After just six months on the job in 2015, Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey hopped an overnight flight from Paris to Mexico City. It was a 12-hour plane ride, and he flew coach.
At the Paris Airshow, he had pitched aerospace industry leaders on the perks of the Grand Canyon State. The Mexico City leg was part economic development, part signal: We’re here to make friends, as former Ducey chief of staff Kirk Adams recalled it, after prior administrations’ divisive immigration policies had soured relations with Arizona’s southern neighbor.
It was a telling page in the initial chapter of Ducey’s eight years in office, a tenure the fiscally conservative Republican marked by stabilizing and growing the state’s finances, rebuilding its economy after the recession of the late 2000s and rebranding Arizona’s image in the national limelight.
Ducey, who is now 58, did much of the work behind the scenes, leaning on his talking points and business chops built prior to his time in the public sector.
We’ve left the state better than we found it..
While praised for changing the state’s economic outlook — including from his Democratic successor, Gov.-elect Katie Hobbs — running Arizona like a business came with success stories and a few failures. His policy wins, especially a private school voucher program similar to one voters rejected years ago, were often as divisive as the state’s politically purple landscape, and he has faced criticism that those efforts benefited his allies and wealthy Arizonans more than the majority of residents.
After eight years in office, Ducey’s leadership has reshaped the state, potentially for generations.
When he leaves the Governor’s Office on Jan. 2, Ducey will be the first Arizona governor in 35 years to finish two full terms.
