Arizona files suit to require U.S. House to seat Adelita Grijalva

Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes filed a lawsuit Tuesday against the U.S. House of Representatives to force Congress to seat U.S. Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva.

Mayes, alongside Grijalva, filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., demanding House Speaker Mike Johnson swear the newly elected representative into office after her landslide election a month ago.

In the 17-page lawsuit, Mayes laid out her case, writing Grijalva “indisputably meets the constitutional qualifications of the office” but has been denied her rightful place “simply because the speaker has decided to keep the House out of ‘regular session.'”

Lawsuit: Grijalva & State of Arizona sue to have new congresswoman seated

“If the speaker were granted that authority, he could thwart the peoples’ choice of who should represent them in Congress by denying them representation for a significant portion of the two-year term provided by the Constitution,” Mayes wrote. “Fortunately, the Constitution does not give that authority to the speaker — or anyone else.”

“Speaker Mike Johnson is actively stripping the people of Arizona of one of their seats in Congress and disenfranchising the voters of Arizona’s seventh congressional district in the process,” Mayes said in a published statement.

“By blocking Adelita Grijalva from taking her rightful oath of office, he is subjecting Arizona’s seventh congressional district to taxation without representation. I will not allow Arizonans to be silenced or treated as second-class citizens in their own democracy,” Mayes said.

“Speaker Johnson’s obstruction has gone far beyond petty partisan politics — it’s an unlawful breach of our Constitution and the democratic process. The voters of Southern Arizona made their choice, yet for four weeks, he has refused to seat a duly elected member of Congress — denying Southern Arizona its constitutional representation,” Grijalva said. “I’m proud to join Attorney General Mayes in standing up for the more than 800,000 Arizonans who have been stripped of their voice in Congress. Speaker Johnson cannot continue to disenfranchise an entire district and suppress their representation to shield this administration from accountability and block justice for the Epstein survivors.”

The lawsuit was filed in both the names of Grijalva, as the winner of the election, and the state of Arizona. The defendants are the U.S. House of Representatives, House Clerk Kevin McCumber, and Sergeant of Arms William McFarland.

The speaker is “blocking me from serving,” Grijalva told the Tucson Sentinel over the weekend.

“Republicans know that once I’m sworn in, it won’t just chip away at their razor-thin majority — I will become the decisive 218th signature to force a vote on releasing the Epstein files,”she said in a message to supporters.

Grijalva — the first Latina elected to Congress from Arizona — won 69 percent of the vote in the Sept. 23 special election to fill the CD 7 seat left vacant when her father, U.S. Rep. Raul Grijalva, died last spring from cancer.

While the House routinely seats new members immediately when an election isn’t in doubt, Adelita Grijalva hasn’t been able to be sworn in and get to work.

The delay means she can’t open an office in Tucson or Washington, nor hire staff. After the former congressman’s death, the CD 7 office remained open with staffers doing constituent work — helping with veteran’s benefits, Social Security issues and other matters are at the core of local district office functions – under the supervision of the House Clerk’s Office. But the CD 7 offices were instructed to close on Election Day, in preparation for the seating of a new member.

Last Tuesday, Arizona state officials formally certified the election, declaring the results of the outcome. Democrats have pointed to the finality of the election canvass as removing any excuse for not seating Grijalva, although it’s rare that a new member of Congress is not immediately seated if an election is not in dispute.

Johnson has refused to set a date for Grijalva oath. The House has been holding brief “pro forma” sessions daily while the speaker has told members to carry out “district work periods” each week for the past month. The last day the House held regular business on the floor was Sept. 19.

On Friday, he announced that Monday, Oct. 20 through Sunday, Oct. 26 would be another week without a regular session of the House.

During the daily pro forma sessions — which last only three or four minutes — the GOP leadership have refused to recognize any Democratic representatives in order to forestall a motion to seat the new congresswoman from Southern Arizona.

Grijalva said last week that Johnson “has exhausted every excuse to delay my swearing-in.”

She blamed his reluctance to seat her on her promise to be the 218th and deciding signature on a discharge petition to force a vote on House legislation to release files related to deceased financier Jeffrey Epstein, who died in New York’s Metropolitan Correctional Center in 2019 shortly after he was arrested on sex trafficking charges.

“I am simply asking him to abide by the same precedent he set when he swore in his Republican colleagues within 24 hours of their special elections and during pro forma sessions earlier this year,” Grijalva said last week. “Any further delay reveals his true motive: Speaker Johnson is stalling because he knows I will be the 218th signature on the discharge petition to release the Epstein files.”

The New York Medical Examiner and Federal Bureau of Prisons ruled Epstein’s death a suicide but that determination has been met with public skepticism. During his 2024 campaign, President Donald Trump said he would “probably” release files related to Epstein but so far, the files released from the Justice Department have mostly been documents that were already public.

Legislation in the House of Representatives to force the release of the Epstein files has stalled, but 218 signatures on a discharge petition would force Johnson to allow a vote on the House floor. Grijalva noted Johnson swore in other members of Congress who won special elections right after their districts voted, without waiting for official results or final vote counts. U.S. Rep. James Walkinshaw, a Virginia Democrat, was seated last month just a day after winning his special election. Under the U.S. Constitution, the House of Representatives is the sole judge of the qualifications of its members, and congressional procedures dictate that a new member is seated by a vote of that body – generally by unanimous consent.

Democrats have pointed out that the House not being in regular session has not been a barrier to having new members take their seats and begin work. Earlier this year, Johnson swore in two Florida Republicans within 24 hours of their victories in special elections, during pro forma sessions.

Grijalva was on the House floor on Sept. 30 — one week after her election — hoping to be sworn in. The Republican presiding over the chamber ended the pro forma session in just under three minutes, ignoring Democrats’ chants of “Swear her in!”

Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, at the beginning of October that he would schedule Grijalva’s swearing-in ceremony when Congress returned from recess on Oct. 7, but because of the ongoing government shutdown that started on Oct. 1, he has kept the House of Representatives in recess.

Two weeks ago, Johnson told U.S. Sens. Mark Kelly and Ruben Gallego, both Arizona Democrats, that he would not swear Grijalva into office until the government reopens.

Johnson has halted all substantive business in the House of Representatives since the shutdown, repeatedly announcing on Friday afternoons that the next week would be another “district work period.”

Last week, Mayes warned she would sue, giving Johnson two days to seat Grijalva or face a lawsuit.

“It’s way past time for Mike Johnson to stop the political games and seat Adelita without delay,” AG Mayes wrote.

In her suit, Mayes said the U.S. Constitution “does not specify who must administer the oath, only that representatives must take it.”

“The speaker may not use his statutory obligation to administer the oath under,” the law to “arbitrarily delay seating a member when there is no dispute as to the election or qualifications and no practical reason why he is unable to administer the oath.”

She noted Johnson has been in Washington D.C. over the past few weeks and “has not identified any reason that he (or a designee) is unable to administer the oath” to Grijalva, nor has he “identified any valid reason for refusing to promptly seat Ms. Grijalva.”

She accused Johnson of delaying the oath to prevent Grijalva from signing the discharge petition, and to “strengthen his hand in the ongoing budget and appropriations negotiations.”

Mayes asked the court to intervene and enter a judgement requiring Grijalva be “deemed” a member of the U.S. House once she has taken her oath, and if Johnson has not administered the oath, this should instead by done by “any person authorized by law to administer oaths.”