TAAAZE Addresses Axon’s Outrageous Scottsdale Election Spending

Statement from Axon Apartment Opposition Group, Taxpayers Against Awful Apartment Zoning Exemptions, About Current and Future Scottsdale City Council Elections

(Scottsdale, Ariz.) Amid all the other rancor in Scottsdale, we had not intended to spend money to influence the outcome of the Scottsdale City Council elections in 2026. Unfortunately, Axon has ruthlessly decided to do the opposite. It is spending lavishly to oppose the three people in the race who opposed its plans to build the largest apartment complex in city and state history—an obscene and horribly designed request that has nothing to do with a multibillion-dollar company being able to finance its previously approved corporate headquarters.

Axon Rendering

The candidates who stood with the vast majority of Scottsdale residents opposing the massive apartment scheme were and are Bob Littlefield, Michelle Ugenti-Rita, and Barry Graham. They also opposed Axon’s bait-and-switch with the Arizona State Land Department to make the apartment scheme possible, shortchanging Arizona public schools—the beneficiaries of state land sales—by more than $100 million.

Now, Axon is attempting to purchase a Scottsdale City Council that will be beholden to its massive apartment ambitions. In the past, other corporations and developers have attempted similar tactics to build more and more in the city. Voters have rejected such efforts.

As long as Bob Littlefield remained chairman of our political action committee, which was formed to put Axon’s massive apartments to a public vote and has subsequently sued to stop the plan on multiple levels, our committee could not engage in the City Council races because doing so would violate campaign laws governing independence and coordination. This is why noted Valley attorney and former chief of staff to a Scottsdale mayor Tim La Sota will be replacing Bob Littlefield as chairman of TAAAZE, effective today.

This will provide our group with the flexibility to support or oppose candidates—one or more than one—in the primary or in the run-off election in November.

This flexibility will also allow us to undertake recalls against current or future councilmembers who provide additional favors to Axon’s apartment ambitions beyond what was already agreed to in the so-called “compromise” on November 17, 2025, on a 4-3 vote with Mayor Borowsky casting the deciding vote.

Axon was granted 600 apartments and 600 condominiums. Since then, Axon has refused to provide documentation to ensure that condominiums will actually be condominiums—as the city cannot enforce such—despite assurances Axon’s own lawyer recently made in front of a Maricopa County Superior Court judge overseeing both lawsuits against the Axon apartment project. The few supporters that exist for Axon’s apartments have recently abused and weaponized the recall process by initiating one against Councilwoman Jan Dubauskas.

Just as we organized to amass 27,000 signatures in just 30 days to put Axon’s apartments to a public vote before Axon convinced the Arizona State Legislature and Governor Katie Hobbs to eviscerate Scottsdale voter rights—the subject of ongoing litigation—the same resources and passion will be deployed to put to a vote those people who upsize the current Axon allotment or provide any additional development favors for its massive apartment development.