WATCH: Full Debate Of Rep. Crane's "Don't Say DEI In the Military" Amendment; It was more than just "colored people" (READ Text of Amendment)

Arizona Rep. Eli Crane (R-CD2) drew national attention when he blurted out that his amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act "has nothing to do with whether or not colored people or Black people or anybody can serve, okay."

Rep. Joyce Beatty, who was handling the debate for the Democratic opposition, immediately called for the offensive term to be stricken from the record. Crane asked to amend it to "people of color", but Beatty refused and the words were removed from the record by unanimous consent.

The heated exchange came at the end of the 10-minute debate, and Crane was forceful - and occasionally, sarcastic - in arguing for his bill. He claimed that "what's divisive is that the military is becoming a political - a social - experiment, before saying he doesn't know how many Democrats served in the military.

Here is the actual text of the amendment, which the House approved later in the evening on a party-line vote. Given his remarks about "social experiment", the core purpose appears to be to prevent any training involving "diversity, equity, or inclusion". 

More of Crane's comments: "The military was never intended to be inclusive. Its strength is not its diversity. Its strength is its standards."

--"Diversity can be a great thing, but it cannot be our focus. And I'm going to tell you guys this right now: you can keep playing around these games with diversity, equity and inclusion, but there are some real threats out there. And if we keep messing around and we keep lowering our standards, it's not going to be good." 

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BREAKING: Gallego Raises $3.8M In 1st Quarter Of Senate Race, Easily Out-Raising Independent Sinema

Rep. Ruben Gallego raised $3.8M in the same period, after announcing that he would seek the Sinema-vacated Democratic nomination for next year's election. He now has $2.7M in the bank.

Gallego quickly stepped into the void and cranked up the national fundraising machine. His expenses were more than $2M, so he only added $1.4M to the cash on hand. However, the report does send a statement to both the incumbent and Republicans looking to enter the race.

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BREAKING: Sinema Sets New Fundraising PR - Rakes In More Than $2.1M In 1Q23, Including Money From New "No Labels" Party

Arizona Senator Kyrsten Sinema was a prodigious fundraiser as a Democrat. As an Independent, she has shattered her previous fundraising PR (personal record), raking in more than $2.1M in the first three months of 2023. 

She also received a modest $10,000 in February from the No Labels PAC (the maximum they could give). They filed petition signatures to become a ballot-worthy political party on Arizona's 2024 ballot.

That $2.1M is approximately $500,000 more in total receipts than she collected in her previous record quarter (1Q22).  Approximately $252,000 is from PACs, and the rest from individuals.

(To arrive at the PAC figures, we inspected both her primary committee and her joint fundraising committee reports.)

Amazingly, Rep. Ruben Gallego raised $3.8M in the same period, after announcing that he would seek the Sinema-vacated Democratic nomination for next year's election. He now has $2.7M in the bank.

We have not yet had a chance to dig into the 870+ pages of contributions and expenses. If anything jumps out at you, please feel free to call it to our attention, Paul . Weich . AZlaw @ gmail.com (no spaces).

Below is a snapshot of today's filing, a table of her previous fundraising numbers, and the principal committee report.

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NEW AND FIRST: AZ Senate Leaders Met About "Hostile Behavior" In Elections Committee Weeks Before Bribery Conspiracy Theory

Democratic and Republican leaders in the Arizona State Senate met to discuss the activities in the Senate Elections Committee, weeks before Thursday's "presentation" went off the rails in pushing a vast cartel-led bribery conspiracy theory.

Arizona's Politics/Arizona's Law has verified (from two different sources) the Feb. 6 meeting between Senate President Warren Petersen and Minority Leader Raquel Teran and ranking committee member Juan Mendez. Democrats say Thursday's day-long presentation to the House and Senate Elections Committees "of course violated what Democrats had hope would come of the meeting."

The Feb. 6 meeting was requested by the two Democratic Senators after Senate Elections Committee Chair Wendy Rogers had used two successive weekly meetings to host unsworn presentations pushing unproven allegations about the 2020 and 2022 elections. They indicate that Rogers also displayed "hostile behavior" in cutting off 
Democratic members and forbidding them from speaking words like "conspiracy theory".

Calli Jones, the Communications Director for the Democratic caucus in the Senate, tells Arizona's Politics that "the continued statements throwing Representative Harris under the bus are a weak attempt to shift the blame away from Republican leadership."

Arizona's Politics has asked Senate President Petersen for responses related to the February 6 meeting and the subsequent committee meetings/presentations. We will update this article as warranted.

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NEW and FIRST: Hamadeh Supporter Sets Up Federal SuperPAC... To Support His Rearview Mirror AZ AG Campaign (READ Filing)

Abe Hamadeh lost his 2022 election for Arizona Attorney General, and the position is not up for election again until 2026. He is continuing to contest his super-close loss to Kris Mayes, with a Motion for a New Trial pending in Superior Court.

However, a new federal SuperPAC - along with a new website - will allow you to make unlimited contributions to support his quest.

The "Arizona's Bold Era PAC" (aka ABE PAC) filed with the U.S. Federal Election Commission late Tuesday night. Interestingly, no concurrent state filing seems to have been made.

ABE PAC is an independent expenditure effort, which means it cannot coordinate efforts with Hamadeh. The only name attached to it is the Virginia woman who filed the statement of organization, Maria Wojciechowski.

Wojciechowski is also the treasurer for the well-funded American Patriots PAC and an America First Oklahoma PAC. We have reached out to her to learn more, and will update as warranted.

The first finance report is not due to be filed until the end of July.

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TODAY: 2 of AZ's 3 Democratic Reps. Vote With GOP House To Prohibit U.S. Petroleum Reserves From Going To China(ARIZONA'S POLITICAL SHORTS)

1/27, 3:30pm: "2 of AZ's 3 Democratic Reps. Vote With GOP House To Prohibit U.S. Petroleum Reserves From Going To China"

Two of Arizona's 3 Democratic Congressman voted with the House GOP (and a majority of Democrats) to prohibit sales from the country's Strategic Petroleum Reserve from benefitting China. The largely symbolic measure passed the House today, 331-97.

Reps. Ruben Gallego (D-CD3) and Greg Stanton (D-CD4) joined all Republicans and 95 other Democrats in voting "aye". Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-CD7) was the only Arizonan to vote "nay".

The language of the bill could fit on a postcard: "Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the Secretary of Energy shall not draw down and sell petroleum products from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve—

(1) to any entity that is under the ownership, control, or influence of the Chinese Communist Party; or

(2) except on the condition that such petroleum products will not be exported to the People’s Republic of China.

The issue arose last year when gas prices skyrocketed and the government sold off a portion of the reserves. The measure is largely symbolic because (a) it is not likely to pass the Senate and be signed into law by President Joe Biden, and (b) because even the sales from the reserve are part of a global petroleum market - the price per barrel paid by China would be the same if the reserve barrels were sold domestically or to China.

***

1/27, 3pm: "Lake and Senior Advisor Lose In RNC Chair Battle; Latter Makes News For Expletive-Filled Campaigning"

No word on the language former Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake used in California today during the RNC meeting, but her senior advisor made some national news for it.

Lake and Caroline Wren were at the meeting trying to help Harmeet Dhillon push Ronna McDaniel out of the RNC Chair. According to Politico's reporting, Wren's efforts as top adviser seemed to focus on dropping f-bombs.

Wren had also been an advisor to former President Donald Trump and was a key fundraiser for the Jan. 6 efforts.

McDaniel retained the Chairmanship. Wren's streak continues.

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NEW: Former AZ Lawmaker's Charter Schools Secure New Muni Bond Issue, Bringing State-Blessed Debt Load To $89.5M (ARIZONA'S POLITICAL SHORTS)

(CORRECTION: This article has been re-written to reflect that Eddie Farnsworth is not a brother of current State Sen. David Farnsworth. Eddie's brother named David is the current Executive Director of the entity which purchased the Benjamin Franklin Charter Schools from Eddie. Arizona's Politics regrets any confusion resulting from the error.)

Congratulations to former State Senator and Charter School mogul Eddie Farnsworth. His new $19.5M Arizona IDA bond issue hit the market this past week, to benefit the Queen Creek campuses.

Farnsworth's brother, David (not related to the current State Senator David Farnsworth), is the Executive Director of the Benjamin Franklin Charter Schools.  David represented BFCS at the Nov. 30 meeting when Arizona agreed to grant its blessing to make the loan (aka the bonds) tax-free to the lenders (the bondholders). Bond experts Moody’s notes that the charter schools will now have $89.5M in state sponsored bonds outstanding.

 

While with the Arizona Republic, Craig Harris* reported extensively on the former lawmaker's efforts to build a long-term money-making charter school operation.

* Get ready, Coronado (CA, and seasonal AZ refugees), Craig announced yesterday that The Coronado News will be starting up on Feb. 1. He'll be the editor. Congratulations to David AND Craig!

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BREAKING: Kyrsten Sinema Parts Ways With Longtime Democratic Campaign Compliance Firm (READ FEC Filings)

UPDATE, 1/20, 12pm:

***

ORIGINAL ARTICLE, 12/15, 2:30pm: "Kyrsten Sinema Parts Ways With Longtime Democratic Campaign Compliance Firm (READ FEC Filings)"

Now that Arizona Senator Kyrsten Sinema is no longer a Democrat, she is parting ways with her longtime Democratic compliance firm. Today's development also raises the question of whether she will have to rebuild other parts of her campaign finance juggernaut.

Common Cents Consulting is an Arizona compliance consulting firm that has worked with Sinema since before she entered Congress in 2012. And President Darryl Tattrie notes in his LinkedIn profile that he has been "happily helping democrats win compliantly since 1997 :-)."

Sinema's three campaign committees - her principle "Sinema for Arizona", the "Getting Stuff Done" leadership PAC, and the "Sinema Leadership Fund" - all filed amended Statements of Organization with the Federal Election Commission today replacing Common Cents with the apparently-unknown "Santa Rosa Partners"*.

It is unclear whether the major switch was initiated by Sinema's campaign organization or by Common Cents Consulting. Arizona's Politics has reached out to both and will update as warranted.

In the past two years - a non-election cycle - Sinema's three committees paid Common Cents more than $170,000 to make sure that they remain in compliance with federal campaign finance laws. During that period, Sinema raised more than $9.1M. Combined, the committees are holding some $9.7M cash on hand.

Other parts of Sinema's campaign infrastructure could also be in for changes. ActBlue is her contribution-processing platform, and it specifically states that it serves "Democratic candidates". Sinema's principle committee paid ActBlue $126,000 in the 2021-22 fundraising cycle. NGPVan provides voter outreach services (and more) to Sinema's committees; it features its support to "Democratic and progressive campaigns and organizations". NGPVan was paid more than $60,000 this past cycle. Arizona's Politics has reached out to both and will update as warranted.

Those companies do provide services to multiple Democrats running against each other in a primary election. However, if a Democrat is running against an Independent Sinema in the general election, different pressures will likely apply.

* The new email address given to the FEC for the committee is "compliance@SantaRosaPartners.com". No website or search results come up for that entity and no other federal campaigns reported paying that entity in the past two years.

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