Reports from the INFAMOUS Republican Party closed meeting!Posted: 2015-04-20 Arizona Freedom Alliance 4-19-15
We are the riff-raff PCs not allowed into the meeting, but we have interviewed several folks who were in attendance at the AZGOP meeting that was closed to the precinct committeemen. Like everything, you get different accounts of the same incident but all of them were similar enough except for the wide diversion about the vote on closing the primary.
Let's start at the beginning, with the protesters who were outside the building. The first person who arrived well ahead of everyone else saw a notice stuck to the front door of the building. It referred to the fact that the meeting would be closed to everyone who was not specifically supposed to be there. That is not a direct quote of the wording but that was the gist of the message. The person related that there was no one else around at the time she arrived and presumed the note was put there by someone within the AZGOP to let people know who would and would not be able to get access to the meeting. Other protestors arrived and milled around.
Later, staff came to open the door and took the sign down. No one we questioned among the protesters had seen the note except the one woman who arrived quite early. We mention this because at the end of the meeting, Chairman Graham accused the protesters of using GLUE to put posters all over the walls that were newly painted. In reality, there was one paper sign on the door, perpetrator unknown. Never let a good crisis go to waste!
As protesters arrived, they were met by three deputies from the Sheriff's office. AFA recorded one protester asking one of the officers why they were there. They were "there to warn protesters they were not allowed to step off the sidewalk onto AZGOP property." Remember, the protesters were calm and were elected precinct committeemen. The building is the Republican party headquarters, a place that for years was open to any PC who wished to come... to meetings, to visit with staff, to use the space for small meetings and gatherings of fellow Republicans. Those days are in the past.
When asked who asked them to be at the meeting (on our dime, by the way), the deputy who appeared to be the lead guy, said he did not know. The order came from inside the party. What were they there to do? Only to keep PCs off the property. Was there anything else they were there to do? Not that the deputy had been told. Some of the PCs were seen on their cell phones. Who were they calling? Around 9:00, an operative from LD28 (Alberto Gutier) came out and told the deputies that they could let the PCs on the property so long as they didn't disturb anything, which they hadn't. Shortly thereafter, all three deputies got in their private vehicles and pulled out of the parking lot and drove away, never to be seen again. The operatives who brought them there didn't even give them a doughnut! Surprisingly, no one stormed the building. There were about 30 protesters, some carrying signs that said, “Close the Primary,” and “Recall Robert Graham.” Some carried flags. Passersby waved and honked throughout the morning.
For the AZGOP take on the protest, please see the video taken and posted by Marc onhttp://arizonafreedomalliance.ning.com/group/all-things-conservativ.... Scroll to page 2 of the Comments. Notice how Chad Heywood, Executive Director, mentioned how important the PCs are and that they are elected to their positions. Note that Chad said the room was packed but the voice behind the camera said he had looked inside and it was not packed. More on that later. Enough about those crazy PCs who have the insane idea that this is their Republican party. Let's take a peek inside the meeting.
First, the agenda was insanely long. The meeting ended up going from 10 am to 3:30 pm. Reports were fairly unanimous: it was a waste of time. But back to the proceedings and we won't bore you with a blow by blow of the events.
After some unnecessary speakers had their way with the PCs and after Graham couldn't resist taking a swipe at AFA as though we didn't tell the truth, documents be-damned, the first vote was to accept the quarterly Treasurer's Report that was up on a screen. We all know how much the Chairman loves to put up charts and graphs and squigglies, so much of the day was given to visuals. The Treasurer's Report was approved. Graham could not resist taking a swipe at the candidate for treasurer who ran on the other slate.... a former auditor! In pure theater fashion and clearly orchestrated, former Treasurer, Timothy Lee, shouted at the Chairman to “tell them about the charge for the FEC to investigate her complaint.” To which Graham said that he got a call from the investigators who told him they knew his reports were whistle clean but they were compelled to investigate anyway and the cost would be $30,000. Digressing, let us say that we asked the candidate in question what happened when she contacted the FEC with the idea of filing a report based on her (auditor's) view of the finance reports. She said at the time that the FEC said they were very familiar with AZGOP as they had several claims against the current reports. No elaboration on that statement from the FEC. However, Graham did elaborate about how reports go to someone at this level and then they go to another agency at that level and some expenses were reported twice but really, it's just no big deal. Something smells, well, odd, don't you think? The FEC doesn't have a sense of humor! However, Graham made an unusual statement: if it hadn't been for having to spend that $30,000 on the FEC report – that came in late January 2015 – he could have spent $30,000 more on the elections that ended three months before. That Graham is downright clairvoyant.
Then the body was asked to vote to approve the budget. What budget? With all the technology that Chairman Graham loves so much, the best he could do was put up a few headlines with numbers attached that were so vague no one had a clue what the budget actually was. Reports are that the spin machines were working at warp speed. One voting PC stood and requested that a line item for $75,000 be put in the budget to pay any expenses for closing the primary. Nope, said the Chairman, we can just allocate such a small sum out of what is already budgeted for, whatever that is. Apparently, you had to pass it so you could see what was in it because it was put to a vote and actually passed with on knowledge of any details of where the money was coming and going. Ouoted from one person in the meeting, “Taken 4 a ride.” My goodness! Don't try that at your LD meeting!
The meeting droned on, blah blah. Attention waned. Blah. Blah. But it finally got to the main attraction: the closed primary issue. Graham, to his credit and with total disregard for the State Committeemen who voted in a huge majority to close the primary, had stuffed the notebooks with letters, some not even on a letterhead, from various attorney's that bore an odd similarity in content and style, all outlining the end of the world/end of the party burden it would be to close the primary. Lawsuits. Money galore which we would think would be no problem given the fundraising prowess of the Chairman, or so he brags. Years in the making. Against the Constitution... no detail of persuasion was missed. Chaotic discussion ensued. Finally, as several reports stated, in mid-discussion, Jenny White, 1st Vice Chair of the Maricopa County Republicans, again straight from the script, got up and asked to move to adjourn the meeting. Oh, well, they were only discussing the most important issue of the meeting, so, let's just shut it down, what do you say? That was voted down.
Someone else asked to have a recess. That was voted down because the motion was not properly stated. The motion was restated, to recess for up to six weeks and then re-convene. This is where the confusion came in. Several of our contacts said the motion passed. In fact, we believe the motion failed. All those who reported to us said that Graham was in rare, silver tongued form, spewing charm right and, uh, right! He took a voice vote. One side shouted louder than the other with non-voting LD chairs shouting out inappropriately, proving only who could shout the loudest. People got restless, got up and wandered around, got some food, went to the facilities, strolled outside. During this period, Graham decided to take a stand and count vote. Without all voters present in the room, the vote was conducted, Secretary Linda White seemed to forget exactly how to count, said some, and miraculously, the vote was not to pursue closing the primary. What was the vote count? Well, that seems to be either a secret or totally unknown. A vast right wing conspiracy of State Committeeman dunces had voted in a huge majority to close the primary but apparently, hardly any of them came to that meeting.
To be fair, someone named Daniel Stefanski,
Oh, and about that teaser earlier about whether the room was packed or not.... well, yes and no. Instead of the usual row upon row seating at these kinds of meetings, the AZGOP staff removed many of the chairs and set up tables instead, substantially reducing the number of PCs who could fit in the room. Now we had to wonder, why was the room set up with a bunch of tables when PCs had been saying for weeks that they wanted to come to observe the proceedings of THEIR party politics? Scratching our head, scratching our head in wonder.
Here's the kicker: one of the protesters, a rather tall man from Riders USA, not a PC but came to protest with his buddies because, well, they just didn't think this was right, walked into the room, was seen by staff, no one asked him to leave. No one asked him anything. To be fair, he was a rather large man! So the deal is this: if you want to get into a closed AZGOP meeting, bulk up and look tall, wear biker jeans, a vest covered with patriotic patches and a look of authority. No one will bother you!
One last thing: Channel 10 arrived on the scene with camera and reporter and interviewed a few protesting PCs. It made the 9:00 Saturday night news right near the end! The last sentence was a quote from someone from AZGOP: the only reason they closed the meeting is because there was just no space! Tables don't vote, so they take priority!
Next up: we have several “man on the protest street” interviews recorded that will be posted in a day or two.
One last comment, really, this time: many think we at AFA don't like Robert Graham. Not true at all. We are quite taken with his handsome good looks, his charismatic spin, his ability to charm the monkeys out of the trees. His clairvoyance! It's a gift to be appreciated. It's that we happen to like facts more. And spin doesn't really work on us! This article is made up from reports from several who were in the room, some with recorders.
http://arizonafreedomalliance.ning.com/group/all-things-conservative/forum/topic/show?id=6399857%3ATopic%3A62258&xgs=1&xg_source=msg_share_topic
|
|
|||||||||||||||||
If you would like to get the latest news from EVNN, |
Catching the News that others let get away... |