Rep. Paul Gosar takes a tax break on his 'primary' residence. It's not in his district
Ronald J. Hansen
Six years after Rep. Paul Gosar promised his constituents he would eventually buy a home in his adopted district, he still hasn’t done so.
The four-term Republican lawmaker still rents a Prescott apartment in Arizona's 4th Congressional District and primarily lives in Flagstaff, according to Coconino County property records and Yavapai County voter registration records.
Gosar and his wife, Maude Gosar, have for years received $600 state-subsidized discounts on their Flagstaff property taxes because that is classified as their primary residence, the records show. His wife remains registered to vote in Coconino County, while he is registered in Yavapai County.
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Gosar has maintained an apartment in Prescott since switching in 2012 from the state’s politically competitive 1st Congressional District, which includes his home in Flagstaff, to its safely-Republican northwestern district.
There’s no law requiring members of Congress to live within their district. But Gosar has long maintained that he planned to buy a home in Prescott to live among his constituents.
Gosar did not return repeated requests for comment about the matter. He has dismissed the residency questions in the past.
"The (Arizona) Republic might find it odd that I don't live a lavish lifestyle. While my apartment might be a bit spartan for their tastes, it is just fine by me," Gosar said in a 2014 statement. "I'm less focused on what kind of interior decorating happens at home than what my job is as the representative of the 4th district."
Where does Gosar intend to reside?
At a time when there are serious issues before Congress, ranging from the effect of Russia intervention in American elections to the government’s $20 trillion national debt, Gosar’s primary address can seem like a trivial matter.
But it can also be seen as a politician unable to keep even the most basic promise to his constituents.
Joe Kanefield, a lawyer who oversaw the state's elections under then-Secretary of State Jan Brewer, said the law requires a determination of where a person resides or intends to remain, a soupy standard that defies easy answers.
"This is intent. It's factual, it's not a question of statutes," he said. "Residency cases are tough."
But establishing intent also requires more, for example, than a statement from Gosar, Kanefield said. Proving someone doesn't intend to live somewhere is also problematic, he said.
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The question occasionally pops up in state-level contests, where candidates by state law must reside in their district.
In 2012, state Rep. Darin Mitchell was disqualified from running for a legislative seat in southwestern Arizona, but the the decision was overturned on appeal because of a filing error in the case.
Former U.S. Rep. Bob Stump, a Republican who once represented the West Valley and much of what makes up Gosar's current district today, faced his own residency issues. He owned an 80-acre farm in Tolleson and lived in central Phoenix.
"That (farm) is my place of business," Stump told The Republic in 2001, near the end of his 26-year congressional career. "I'm sure nobody ever thought I did reside there. ... My interpretation is that you declare your residency wherever you want."
From a state tax perspective, determining the location of primary residence depends on several factors, including how much someone occupies a property each year and the owner's registered voting precinct.
Maude Gosar is listed as co-owner of the Flagstaff house and is registered to vote in Coconino County, and would appear to qualify for the tax credit. Armando Ruiz, the Coconino County assessor, said Maude Gosar sent in paperwork in 2015 to keep the house eligible for the state tax credit as part of a routine check by the county.
Is Gosar safe in his district?
Gosar occupies among the safest Republican seats in Congress. Only 32 of 240 GOP House members nationally had districts that voted more decisively for President Donald Trump in 2016.
On the day in 2012 that he announced he was running for Congress in the northwestern Arizona district, Gosar called Yavapai County his home and said he planned to move there.
"Yavapai County, you've been so good to me," Gosar said, according to the Prescott Daily Courier. "I need your support. I'm proud to call Yavapai County home."
The newspaper said Gosar "plans to establish a second home in Prescott until his youngest daughter graduates from Flagstaff High School, then he and his wife plan to move to Prescott full-time."
"I'd like to come down to a lower climate," Maude Gosar said at the time.
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It appears they still haven't.
The Yavapai County Recorder has no property records involving Gosar.
In 2014, Gosar's campaign said he would keep the Flagstaff home to be close to his daughter who had enrolled at Northern Arizona University.
"When he said (he'd buy a house in Prescott), he had every intention of doing that," his campaign said at the time. "I think the voters will understand the circumstances around his daughter going to college in Flagstaff, and other things have changed, which have led to him not buying a house."
In 2015, Gosar publicly described Flagstaff as his home after a shooting at NAU.
"As someone who has called Flagstaff home for many years, and with a daughter who has attended Northern Arizona University, my heart aches for the victims of the shooting that took place early this morning on campus," he wrote in a Facebook post. "In this dark hour, it is difficult to process this tragic incident but my faith in the Flagstaff community remains strong and I am confident that we will be able to heal together."
Controversy, not competition for Gosar
Gosar’s strong conservatism makes him a safe pick in Arizona's most Republican-leaning district.
He won his first term in the House of Representatives in 2010 by 6 percentage points over incumbent Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick in the state's always-competitive 1st district in northeastern Arizona.
In 2012, after the state drew new congressional boundaries, Gosar ran for re-election in the northwestern 4th district that for the first time included the Republican stronghold Prescott Valley, which had been his base of support in 2010.
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In three elections in that district, Gosar has won by an average of 42 percentage points. Republicans currently have a 26-percentage-point voter registration advantage in the district.
In his fourth term, Gosar has established himself as a reliable source for right-wing conspiracies and occasionally made national news for outrageous statements.
Last summer, Gosar suggested in an interview with Vice News for HBO that the deadly white supremacist rally in Charlottesville was planned by "an Obama sympathizer" and that liberal activist George Soros may have been a Nazi collaborator as a youth.
Before Trump's State of the Union speech this year, Gosar called for the deportation of undocumented immigrants who were attending the speech at the invitation of Democratic members, including from Arizona.
Reach the reporter at ronald.hansen@arizonarepublic.com or 602-444-4493. Follow the reporter on Twitter @ronaldjhansen.
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