Month: May 2024

TikTok Sues U.S. Government over New Law Banning App

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TikTok User

On Tuesday, the Chinese social media app TikTok and its parent company filed a lawsuit against the federal government of the United States over a new law threatening to ban the app if it is not sold to another company by next year.

ABC News reports that the lawsuit, filed by TikTok and its Chinese parent company ByteDance, claims the new law is a violation of the First Amendment rights of TikTok’s users. The bill was signed into law by Joe Biden last month, with the TikTok ban being one provision of a larger $95 billion foreign aid package. The law requires ByteDance to sell TikTok within 9 months, or else the app will be banned from use in the United States.

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Schumer Plans to Revive Bipartisan Border Deal

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Axios Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) is seriously considering bringing the failed bipartisan border deal back to the floor for a vote later this month — turning the tables on the GOP’s favorite 2024 issue, Axios has learned. Democrats are launching a border offensive. Senators are slamming Republicans again for killing the border deal months ago and President Biden is unveiling new proposed asylum changes this week. Schumer plans to force Republicans to again reject the border package, according to three Democratic Senate aides familiar. The bill would expedite the asylum process and allow the federal government to curtail asylum access during surges. READ THE FULL STORY                

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Alleged Threats Against LGBTQ ‘Pride’ Event in Montana Revealed to Be a Hoax

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LGBTQ Flags

Several threats made against a pro-LGBTQ “pride” event in Montana have since been determined to be hoaxes simply meant to discourage people from attending.

According to ABC News, the Bozeman Police Department (BPD) investigated two threats that “occurred within the city limits of Bozeman” over the weekend, after two other threats had been made on Friday. The threats were eventually determined to have no credibility, and were simply “used to try to dissuade people from participating.”

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Federal Court Case in Ohio Could Reverse SCOTUS Precedent That Expanded Commerce Clause

Kaitlin Housler
Brewing

Michael Patrick Leahy, CEO and editor-in-chief of The Tennessee Star, said he believes an Ohio court case, Ream v. U.S. Department of Treasury, may succeed in rolling back federal overreach regarding Congress’ power to regulate interstate commerce under the U.S. Constitution’s Commerce Clause.

The Buckeye Institute, an Ohio think tank, filed Ream v. U.S. Department of Treasury in January on behalf of John Ream of Licking County, Ohio.

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Nashville’s Legally Dubious $3.1 Billion Transportation Plan Sparks Debate over Future Tax Burden

Kaitlin Housler
Freddie O'Connell

Ben Cunningham, founder of the Nashville Tea Party, said not only does Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell’s $3.1 billion transit referendum, which is expected to be presented to Davidson County voters on the November ballot, appear illegal under the 2017 IMPROVE Act, but its implementation would inevitably raise property taxes for residents.

O’Connell unveiled his transit plan, “Choose How You Move: An All-Access Pass to Sidewalks, Signals, Service, and Safety,” last month.

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Denver Democrats Push Migrants to Private Homes

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Breitbart As officials in Denver continue rolling evictions of illegal aliens from city-supported migrant shelters due to a lack of funding, many have ended up in illegal tent encampments. But hundreds more have been placed in the homes of private citizens who volunteered to take migrants in, for a stipend. With more than 40,000 of President Joe Biden’s illegal border crossers flooding into Denver in the last year, city officials have struggled to come up with the funding to arrange housing for them all. In February, officials began warning migrants that the money was gone and many will be evicted from shelters if they stay past the 42-day mark. Many of these illegals say the chief problem is they are not legally allowed to work without a federally supplied work permit and without a job they cannot pay their own way. The lack of jobs and shelter evictions has left hundreds to set up illegal tent encampments on public lands. But even that, as NPR recently reported, has its limits as police departments occasionally sweep them away from their camping spots. READ THE FULL STORY                       

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Judge in Trump Classified Docs Case Indefinitely Postpones Trial Date

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Judge Aileen M. Cannon

The judge presiding over the case against former President Donald Trump involving allegations surrounding classified documents indefinitely postponed the trial date Tuesday.

United States District Judge Aileen M. Cannon, a Trump appointee, said that setting a date would be “imprudent” before a number of pre-trial motions were addressed in her ruling. Special counsel Jack Smith unsealed a superseding indictment on July 27, 2023, that included charges against Carlos De Oliveira, a maintenance worker at Mar-a-Lago, the Florida estate owned by Trump after the special counsel initially secured a 37-count indictment against Trump and aide Walter Nauta in June 2023.

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Legal Battle Brews over Nashville Mayor’s $3.1 Billion Transportation Plan

Kaitlin Housler
Freddie O'Connell

Ben Cunningham, founder of the Nashville Tea Party, continues to scrutinize the legality of the Nashville mayor’s $3.1 billion transit referendum expected to be presented in front of Davidson County voters on the November ballot.

Mayor Freddie O’Connell unveiled his $3.1 billion transit plan, “Choose How You Move: An All-Access Pass to Sidewalks, Signals, Service, and Safety,” last month. The plan would be funded through a half-cent increase in the city’s sales tax to construct miles of new sidewalks, bus stops, transit centers, parking facilities, and upgraded traffic signals.

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AstraZeneca Pulls Its COVID Vaccine from European Market

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The Associated Press  The pharma giant AstraZeneca has requested that the European authorization for its COVID-19 vaccine be pulled, according to the EU medicines regulator. In an update on the European Medicines Agency’s website Wednesday, the regulator said that the approval for AstraZeneca’s Vaxzevria had been withdrawn “at the request of the marketing authorization holder.” AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine was first given the nod by the EMA in January 2021. Within weeks, however, concerns grew about the vaccine’s safety, when dozens of countries suspended the vaccine’s use after unusual but rare blood clots were detected in a small number of immunized people. The EU regulator concluded AstraZeneca’s shot didn’t raise the overall risk of clots, but doubts remained. READ THE FULL STORY                 

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Days After Threatening Governor Bill Lee and His Wife, Former Christ Presbyterian Academy Student Who Now Identifies as Male Arrested on Cyberstalking Charge

Matthew Giffin
McKenzie McClure on CPA Campus

A former student of Christ Presbyterian Academy (CPA) in Nashville was arrested on suspicion of cyberstalking days after possibly making a public threat toward Governor Bill Lee and his wife Maria Lee.

McKenzie McClure, also known as Kalvin McClure, was arrested by federal agents after they observed troubling social media activity and McClure left a concerning voicemail to CPA on March 24, 2024, that caused two schools to shut down the following day.

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Memphis Man Released on Bail Hunts Down, Shoots Witness from Trial

Kaitlin Housler
Tavious Wilson

A Memphis man out on bond for his alleged involvement in a shooting earlier this year is behind bars once again after being accused of hunting down and shooting a witness who testified at trial for the earlier shooting case.

On Monday, ABC24 News reported that it had obtained an affidavit from Shelby County court records showing that officers with the Memphis Police Department (MPD) responded to an aggravated assault on May 2 in the area of James Road and Raleigh-Millington Road.

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Pope Francis Appoints Tennessee Native as Bishop of Knoxville

Peter D'Abrosca
James Mark Beckman

Pope Francis has appointed a priest who is a native of Tennessee to become the next Bishop of Knoxville.

“Pope Francis has appointed Reverend James Mark Beckman, as Bishop of Knoxville,” according to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). “Bishop-elect Beckman is a priest of the Diocese of Nashville, and currently serves as pastor of Saint Henry parish in Nashville, Tennessee. The appointment was publicized in Washington, D.C. on May 7, 2024, by Cardinal Christophe Pierre, apostolic nuncio to the United States.”

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MIT Becomes First Elite School to Eliminate Diversity and Inclusion Hiring Requirement

Just the News
MIT President Sally Kornbluth

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology became the first elite university to get rid of its “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” criteria in its hiring requirements, after the university’s president claimed that it does not work.

MIT previously required candidates hoping to join its faculty to provide a statement that shows they understand the “challenges related to diversity, equity, and inclusion,” and describe their “track record of working with diverse groups of people.” They were also required to demonstrate how they plan to advance DEI in their position at the school. But a 2023 poll found that a large majority of the school’s faculty and students were afraid to express their views, according to Fox News.

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Alvin Bragg’s Team Produced Docs at Center of Case Against Trump But Fail to Establish Direct Link

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Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg

Prosecutors finally displayed the documents at the heart of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s case against former President Donald Trump on Monday, but have yet to establish a direct link to demonstrate Trump’s culpability.

Until Monday, prosecutors had been focused on setting up other pieces of their case: the context for the $130,000 payment made to porn star Stormy Daniels to keep her quiet about claims of a sexual encounter and the broader “conspiracy” to influence the 2016 election they allege Trump was involved in. Monday’s witnesses — former Trump Organization controller Jeffrey McConney and Trump Organization accounts payable supervisor Deborah Tarasoff — offered starkly different testimony than earlier witnesses like David Pecker and Keith Davidson, providing no salacious celebrity stories and an almost exclusive focus on accounting.

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Blended Sentencing Law Passed by Tennessee General Assembly Awaits Governor Lee’s Signature

Peter D'Abrosca
Inmate

A law ensuring that Tennessee’s worst juvenile offenders do not walk free upon becoming adults is awaiting the signature of Gov. Bill Lee (R).

HB 043o, passed at the end of the most recent legislative session, “allows a juvenile court to impose a blended sentence on a child 16 years of age or older for a juvenile offense that would be a Class A, B, or C felony if committed by an adult.”

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Report: Biden White House Trying to Force New Regulations to Hinder Second Trump Presidency

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Joe Biden Donald Trump

A new report claims that the Biden Administration is attempting to implement federal regulations that will be difficult to reverse by a future president, as polls increasingly suggest that Joe Biden will lose the November election to former President Donald Trump.

According to the Daily Caller, the report says that President Trump plans to sign multiple resolutions under the 1996 Congressional Review Act if he wins a second term, aimed at reversing many of Biden’s regulations. In response, officials in the Biden White House are examining methods to make regulations more permanent or harder to undo.

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Influential Liberal Donor Organizes Massive Coalition to Throw Cash Behind Voter Mobilization

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Pierre Omidyar

An influential left-of-center donor’s charity launched an initiative compelling other philanthropies to pour money into voter mobilization efforts ahead of the 2024 elections.

Democracy Fund, which was founded and is funded by liberal philanthropist Pierre Omidyar, has rallied a group of 174 organizations and individuals pledging to expedite their disbursement of grants related to efforts including get-out-the-vote operations. The pledge calls on its signatories to either make the bulk of their election-related donations by the end of April, to “move up” disbursements scheduled for later in the year or to streamline their grant approval processes.

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Commentary: A Government Unrepresentative of the People

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Joe Biden

We are in the midst of a presidential campaign year. It’s supposed to be the Super Bowl for political junkies like me. But it feels strange and muted, and, so far, its vibe is uncomfortably similar to 2020.

The 2020 election was strange because of COVID, which became a pretext to change the rules in order to rig the outcome. This time, there is no such excuse for a “basement campaign.” It’s true that Biden is old, feeble, and unpopular. And Trump has been sidelined, quite deliberately, by a malicious New York judge who won’t allow him to travel and conduct his signature rallies. The problem, however, now infects all electoral politics.

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Gov. Kemp Signs Georgia’s Fiscal 2025 Budget

The Center Square
Brian Kemp

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp signed off on the state’s fiscal 2025 budget, a spending plan that includes pay raises for public school teachers and state law enforcement officers.

“This budget in particular will help us further promote economic prosperity in communities all across the state, provide Georgia students a quality education, care for the health and wellbeing of our families, and ensure the safety of our neighborhoods,” Kemp, a Republican, said during a Tuesday signing ceremony, according to his prepared remarks. “And because we’ve budgeted conservatively and refused to spend beyond our means, we’re able to invest in these core areas while cutting taxes at the same time.”

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Many Popular Ohio Jobs Qualify for Government Assistance

The Center Square
Food Workers

Nearly half of the most popular jobs in Ohio pay the average worker so little employees qualify for government assistance to feed a family of three, a new report based on information from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows.

The findings in the Still working for too little in Ohio report from Policy Matters Ohio also showed that those four occupations employ 476,000 or 8.7% of all workers in the state.

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Republican Party Files to Intervene in Pennsylvania Mail-In Ballot Case over Curing of Votes with No Security Sleeve

Tom Pappert

The Republican National Committee (RNC) and Republican Party of Pennsylvania (PAGOP) have filed to intervene in a Butler County lawsuit brought by two voters who want to enable the curing of mail-in ballots returned to election officials without a security sleeve.

The lawsuit was brought by two Pennsylvania voters who submitted mail-in ballots without the required security sleeve. According to their lawsuit, the voters apparently later sought to cure their ballots, but were instead allowed to cast provisional ballots that were ultimately not counted. They filed suit against the Butler County Board of Elections on April 29.

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Legislators Debate Whether to Help University of Minnesota Pay for Costs Associated with Anti-Israel Camp

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Palestine Protest on UMN Campus

It’s been less than a week since a group of anti-Israel activists on the University of Minnesota’s Minneapolis campus packed up their tents and provisions and ended their encampment protest on Northrop Mall.

And now come the questions: How much was the damage incurred by the boycott/divestment/sanctions protesters? Who will pay for it?

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Dominion Energy Dismisses Attempts by Groups to Halt Offshore Wind Construction

The Center Square
Wind mills offshore

Three public interest groups are claiming a legal victory of sorts, saying their actions have led to at least a temporary delay in Dominion Energy’s efforts to begin construction on Virginia’s major offshore wind project – but Dominion disagrees.

The Heartland Institute, the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow and the National Legal and Policy Center have taken action against Dominion several times now regarding the project.

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Georgia Special Committee Turns Focus on Fani Willis’ Spending

The Center Square
Fani Willis

A Republican-led Senate Special Committee on Investigations focused on Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ use of county tax dollars to investigate former President Donald Trump.

The work of the Senate Special Committee on Investigations, created with the passage of Senate Resolution 465, could rank among the most-watched state committees of the year, especially considering its potential impact on this November’s presidential election. The committee’s focus includes allegations that Willis had an affair with Nathan Wade, a special prosecutor formerly on the case.

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Arizona’s 8th District Congressional Candidates Clash in Tense Debate

Christy Kelly
Arizona 8th Congressional District Debate

Last week, PBS hosted a debate with candidates from Arizona’s 8th Congressional District, a Republican stronghold. The event featured intense discussions among participants, including frontrunners Abe Hamadeh and Blake Masters. Also in attendance were State Speaker of the House Ben Toma (R-27); State Senator Anthony Kern (R-27); and former Representative Trent Franks (R-AZ-8), who previously held this seat for almost 15 years.

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Illegal Immigrant Arrested for Attempted Murder Committed in Brazil 35 Days After DOJ Released Him in Arizona

Tom Pappert
Brazilian National

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced on Monday the arrest of an illegal immigrant from Brazil. The agency explained the man has been wanted in Brazil for attempted murder since October.

ICE additionally confirmed the man, whose identity the agency withheld, entered the United States through Arizona’s southern border and was eventually apprehended for deportation in Massachusetts. He will remain in the agency’s custody until he is removed from the country.

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Augusta Lands $184 Million Manufacturing Deal Bringing 350 New E-Mobility Jobs to Richmond County

Debra McClure
GF Casting Solutions Factory

GF Casting Solutions, a producer of lightweight components for the mobility and energy sectors, will invest over $184 million in a new manufacturing facility in Augusta Corporate Park. The facility, which is anticipated to start operations in 2027, will bring 350 additional jobs to Richmond County.

“Georgia is proud to carry the title of the No. 1 state for business to companies across the globe, bringing opportunities to communities in every corner of the state,” said Governor Brian Kemp in a press release last week.

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Chairman Jordan Presses Wray for Data on FBI’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Hiring Practices

Just the News

“We understand that the FBI has struggled with attracting enough qualified applicants from all desired target groups to sustain its mission This is likely due to the FBI re-focusing its recruitment efforts on DEI statistics,” Jordan wrote in the letter to Wray.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, is pressing Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Christopher Wray for more information surrounding the bureau’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) hiring practices and other initiatives.

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Commentary: Mammas, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Police Officers

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Memorial service for a police officer

Four law enforcement officers were shot dead in Charlotte, North Carolina, last week. On hearing the news, I was reminded of my mother’s frequent warnings about police work. Her message? Steer clear. With her husband and her brother patrolling the mean streets of Newark, she didn’t need the added anxiety of having her sons do the same. Today, for the children and spouses of police officers, that anxiety must be unbearable — and not just because of the obvious danger.

You may not have heard of the Charlotte shooting. It vanished from the national news in a flash. Despite the magnitude of the offense, within two or three days the national media had dropped the story cold.

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Former Biden DOJ Official Prosecuting Trump Received Thousands of Dollars From DNC

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Matthew Colangelo

The lead prosecutor for Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s case against former President Donald Trump received thousands of dollars from the Democratic National Committee (DNC) in 2018, Federal Election Commission (FEC) records show.

Matthew Colangelo, who was President Joe Biden’s acting associate attorney general and spent two years in the current president’s Department of Justice (DOJ), joined the Manhattan District Attorney’s office as senior counsel in December 2022. The lawyer received $12,000 from the DNC in 2018 for “political consulting” in two payments of $6,000 on Jan. 31 of that year, FEC records show.

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Biden Gives Fewest Interviews of Any President in 40 Years, Raising Questions Among Friendly Media

Just the News
Joe Biden Doing an Interview

The media is growing weary of President Biden’s avoidance of interviews with journalists, as he has given the fewest of any president in over 40 years.

Mainstream media is noticing that Biden is sitting down for fewer interviews than they are accustomed to presidents giving, which some have speculated is the result of old age and failing memory.

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House Republicans Seek Transparency on Number of Foreign Nationals in U.S. Illegally

The Center Square
Alejandro Mayorkas With Immigrants

A group of 17 Congressional Republicans led by U.S. Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, is calling on Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to provide information on “the total number of illegal aliens currently residing within the United States.”

In a letter to Mayorkas, whom they voted to impeach in February, the Republican lawmakers argue, “The American people deserve an exact accounting of the number of illegal aliens residing in the country, especially if the federal government’s policies have caused that number to surge since the previous estimate.”

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Funding Sources Behind Tennessee Student Groups Linked to Pro-Palestine, Anti-Israel Causes Under Scrutiny

Matthew Giffin
Pro-Palestine protest

As anti-Israel protests on college campuses across the country dominate the headlines, higher education institutions in Tennessee have also harbored a presence of student activism on behalf of the Palestinian side of the Israel-Hamas conflict.

Two student organizations with chapters at some Tennessee colleges—Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) and the Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP)—are among many activist groups across the country that receive abundant funding and harbor ties to left-leaning groups.

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49-Page Complaint Demands Removal of Shelby County Clerk Wanda Halbert After Alleged Incompetence, Bad Administration

Tom Pappert
Shelby County Clerk Wanda Halbert

A 49-page complaint was filed against Shelby County Clerk Wanda Halbert on Monday, demanding she be suspended then removed from office over alleged incompetence and bad management decisions that cost the county hundreds of thousands.

The complaint was filed by Hamilton County District Attorney Coty Wamp in the Shelby County Circuit Court and makes the case that Halbert should be removed due to alleged “willful neglect to perform a duty” assigned to her office.

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DOJ Confirms Person Who Sent ‘Disconcerting’ Message to Christian School Arrested for Alleged Cyberstalking

Matthew Giffin
Christ Presbyterian Academy

An individual who sent a message causing a Nashville private Christian school to close back in March was arrested for alleged cyberstalking, according to court documents. The person also appears to identify as a member of the LGBTQ community.

On March 24, days before the anniversary of the Covenant School shooting, Christ Presbyterian Academy received a message containing “disconcerting language towards the safety of our campus,” school officials said in an email to parents at the time, WSMV reported. CPA and neighboring Currey Ingram Academy in Brentwood closed the next day due to safety concerns. 

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Tennessee Eagle Forum Honors State Sen. Kerry Roberts for Fixing 2022 Law that Granted Professional Licenses to Illegal Immigrants

Tom Pappert
Tennessee State Senator Kerry Roberts

The Tennessee Eagle Forum on Monday announced State Senator Kerry Roberts (R-Springfield) was awarded the Tennessee Eagle Forum Award for 2024 due to his successful legislation that “effectively repealed” a 2022 law which enabled some illegal immigrants to receive state-issued commercial and professional licenses.

Roberts’ legislation, according to a Tennessee Eagle Forum press release, removed key language from Public Chapter No. 11, the 2022 legislation that allowed illegal immigrants to obtain professional or commercial licenses if they are “either a United States citizen or authorized under federal law to work in the United States as verified by the SAVE program.”

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Anti-Israel Activists Behind Columbia University Protests Trained in Cuba for Years

ADN America
Cuba-trained activists at Columbia #ShutItDown4Palestine

Some of the anti-Israel protests taking place at U.S. college campuses, including the recent demonstrations at Columbia University, have been supported by organizations that traveled to communist Cuba to receive resistance training, an ADN investigation has uncovered.

ADN’s investigation coincides with a recent Sunday report published by the New York Post that revealed a radical NYC based organization known as The People’s Forum familiarized anti-Israel activists with Black Lives Matter protest techniques just hours before they stormed Hamilton Hall at Columbia University, and that the group was incited by Manolo De Los Santos – a radical activist organizer with deep ties to communist Cuba.

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Anti-Israel Demonstrations at University of Tennessee Continue Into Sixth Day

Matthew Giffin
People’s School for Gaza

Anti-Israel demonstrations at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville (UTK) continued into their sixth consecutive day on Monday, May 6. A non-student organization calling itself the People’s School for Gaza held demonstrations at multiple locations on UTK’s campus.

The group announced a meeting at 9 a.m. ET in an initial Instagram post and moved across campus throughout the day. By 1:50 p.m. ET, demonstrators had moved to the lawn of the Student Union, according to a post later in the day.

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‘May Be Problematic’: New Study Highlights Another Potential Roadblock for Biden’s Offshore Wind Push

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Offshore wind farm

A new study has identified a potentially massive problem for offshore wind developments that could further hinder the Biden administration’s push for the technology.

The study, published in a scientific journal called Wind Energy Science and authored by researchers from the University of Colorado and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), focuses on what happens when the presence of nearby wind turbines reduces wind speeds for other turbines and their ability to produce power. The researchers project that the “wake effect,” the technical name for the phenomenon, could lead to a loss of up to 38 percent of power generation at one East Coast offshore wind development.

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Hakeem Jeffries Boasts About Dems ‘Effectively’ Running House — Despite GOP Majority

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Congressman Hakeem Jeffries

Democratic Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York claimed that Democrats were “governing as a majority” in the House of Representatives even with nominal Republican control during an interview that aired Sunday.

Jeffries noted that Democrats provided over twice as many votes than Republicans in passing HR 8035, the Ukraine Security Supplemental Appropriations Act in April during the interview with Norah O’Donnell of CBS News that aired on “60 Minutes.” Jeffries boasted of Democratic successes in the GOP-controlled House during the interview, saying that Dems “get things done.”

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Democrats Outnumber Republicans as Commencement Speakers – Again

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Auburn University commencement address

Democrats will again outnumber Republicans as commencement speakers this spring, according to an analysis from The College Fix.

The Fix found similar results last year, after reviewing public statements, news articles, and political donations to determine party affiliation. The Fix reviewed the main graduation speakers at the Southeastern Conference, the Ivy League, and the Big Ten.

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Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office Busts Five for Jail Smuggling Operation

Peter D'Abrosca
Hamilton County Sheriff Austin Garrett

The Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office (HCSO) said in a statement that it has arrested five people for their involvement in a drug smuggling operation into the Hamilton County Jail. 

“This operation, uncovered through a comprehensive investigation revealed a conspiracy responsible for smuggling illegal contraband into the jail,” HCSO said. “The items seized included 12 wrapped bundles of suspected blue Fentanyl, 6 Suboxone strips, 35 strips of Toon Paper (papers laced with THC), some blue powder suspected to be Fentanyl, and approximately 20 blue Fentanyl pills.”

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Navajo County Officials Stonewall Precinct Committeemens’ Request to Create Election Integrity Task Force and Conduct Hand Counts

Rachel Alexander
Celia Laughlin

Concerned Republican precinct committeemen and citizens in Navajo County, a small Republican-leaning county located in the northeastern part of the state, asked the Navajo County Board of Supervisors (NCBOS) recently to take election integrity measures, but are being stonewalled. 

Celia Laughlin told The Arizona Sun Times that in place of addressing their questions and requests at the last board meeting on April 23, Navajo County Manager Bryan Layton “gave a poll worker’s civics class instruction instead.” Layton was appointed county manager less than a year ago, and prior to that he worked in Texas for 10 years. 

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