You’ve probably seen video from November, 2020, when Arizona Governor Doug Ducey got a call from Donald Trump and muted it. The call was recognizably from Trump because the song “Hail To The Chief” was attached to the number Trump called in from. Ducey, at the time, was literally on camera signing off the certification of the 2020 election results from Arizona, so it was complete farce when Trump called in.
As well you know, Trump refused to accept that Arizona had voted for Joe Biden. From the instant that Fox News announced that Arizona had moved into the blue column Trump became incensed. The first thing he did was lash out at Fox News. Fox News responded by instantly — and incomprehensibly — terminating their Political Desk chief, Chris Stirewalt, in a move which was at the time considered extreme and Draconian and has only become regarded as more so as time has gone by. Stirewalt made the right call in the course and scope of doing the job he was paid to do. Whoever fired him was looking to placate Trump with a sacrificial lamb.
In all events, Trump did not stop there. Not even close. He had Rudy Giuliani seek to win the argument that dead people and illegal immigrants had voted in Arizona and he also asked Mike Pence to call Ducey and look for election fraud, where none existed. Washington Post:
The extent of Trump’s efforts to cajole Ducey into helping him stay in power has not before been reported, even as other efforts by Trump’s lawyer and allies to pressure Arizona officials have been made public. […]
Ducey described the “pressure” he was under after Trump’s loss to a prominent Republican donor over a meal in Arizona earlier this year, according to the donor, who like others interviewed for this story spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations. The account was confirmed by others aware of the call. Ducey told the donor he was surprised that special counsel Jack Smith’s team had not inquired about his phone calls with Trump and Pence as part of the Justice Department’s investigation into the former president’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election, the donor said.
Then, as you recall, Strike Force Rudy encamped himself and his team in a hotel in Arizona (at least it wasn’t the parking lot of a crematorium and a sex shoppe) and endeavored to prove fraud. Rusty Bowers subsequently testified to the January 6 Committee that Giuliani, “other Trump aides and the 45th president himself made him think of The Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight, a classic novel of mob incompetence by the late New York journalist Jimmy Breslin.” “This is a tragic parody,” he said. Tragic but true, alas. Bowers also testified that Giuliani told him, “We’ve got lots of theories. We just don’t have the evidence.”
In Arizona, Trump and his attorney, Rudy Giuliani, called then Speaker of the House Rusty Bowers (R) on Nov. 22, 2020. They asked the speaker to convene the legislature to investigate their unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud, which included that votes had been cast en masse by undocumented immigrants and in the names of deceased people. Weeks later, on Dec. 31, 2020 the White House switchboard left a message for the chair of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, Clint Hickman, seeking to connect him with Trump. The supervisor, a Republican, did not return the call.
And Hickman did not return subsequent calls from Trump, either. That must have frosted Trump that people actually had the temerity to go along with election results and not leap to help him in his deranged crusade.
Doug Ducey was labeled a “RINO Republican” by Trump, along with Brian Kemp.
It will be intriguing to see if Jack Smith does get around to talking to Doug Ducey.
I’m shocked, shocked gambling is going on in here. Your winnings sir. Thank you. From Casablanca.
This sinkhole gets deeper everyday. Dante didn’t figure the depths of Hell went even deeper than he saw.
I live in Arizona. I remember seeing that. The Washington Post just reported it I wonder why it took so long for them to do that. I knew it when it was actually happening. Although Doug Ducey was not a good Governor for my state and I am glad that we got a great Governor, Katie Hobbs. at least he did the right thing. Kari Lake was in that election only for the power she would have. She would have destroyed Arizona had she won.