Arizona House Rep Liz Harris ousted for violating ethics rules

Table Of Content

• Housing bill near, lawmaker says
• Expelled GOP lawmaker fails to regain Arizona House seat
• and 2022 Election Denialism
• Role Spreading Multiple Conspiracies Following the 2020 Election
• What happens next to replace expelled Rep. Liz Harris at the Legislature? What to know
• Republicans file ethics complaints against 2 Democrats for outburst on the House Floor

PHOENIX - Expelled Republican lawmaker Liz Harris will not be sent back to the Arizona House of Representatives, Maricopa County officials announced on May 5. Rep. Travis Grantham, a Gilbert Republican serving on the Ethics Committee, said the panel’s conclusions made him “sick to my stomach,” but he stood by the factual evidence that showed Harris lied to the panel. On April 11, the House Ethics Committee issued a report saying Harris broke a rule during an election presentation. The final vote on Wednesday was 46 to 13, with 18 Republicans joining the 28 Democrats in approving the expulsion. Harris, elected for the first time in 2022, made a controversial name for herself early by announcing she would not cast her vote on any bill unless the 2022 election was redone. She issued the statement on Instagram and her campaign website saying in part "it has become obvious that we need to hold a new election immediately."

Arizona House Republicans Expel One of Their Own (Published 2023) - The New York Times

Arizona House Republicans Expel One of Their Own (Published .

Posted: Wed, 12 Apr 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]

Housing bill near, lawmaker says

The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors will choose from a list of three candidates nominated by the Republican precinct committeemen in her district. “It will be perceived as setting the precedent that if you rock the boat too much, you will be expelled,” said Kolodin, who voted against expulsion. Ms. Harris, from Chandler, became just one of a handful of Arizona lawmakers to be expelled.

Expelled GOP lawmaker fails to regain Arizona House seat

When Hobbs, a Democrat, won the governorship in November, Harris said she would not vote for anything unless there was a revote of the 2022 election. The expulsion in Arizona follows the expulsions — for different reasons — of two Black lawmakers in Tennessee. Democrats Justin J. Pearson and Justin Jones were kicked out by a Republican supermajority after the pair — alongside Rep. Gloria Johnson, who is white — led a protest from the House floor calling for reforms to gun laws. It's the second time in six years the House has voted to kick out one of its own. The notable move to expel Harris, who's pushed baseless claims about the 2020 and 2022 elections, comes as members of the state's Republican Party have in recent years led Arizona to become a hive of election denialism. Barton asked the House Ethics Committee to rebuke the complaint from Republicans and accused them of attempting to equate the actions from De Los Santos and Ortiz to people who were present at the January 6, 2021 U.S.

and 2022 Election Denialism

The ethics report also found that Harris lied to the panel when she claimed she had no idea Breger would make such wild accusations. That was problematic enough to merit the ethics investigation and expulsion, according to House Speaker Ben Toma, a Republican and one of the lawmakers falsely accused of criminal activity. A bipartisan, two-thirds majority of the GOP-led House voted Wednesday to kick out Liz Harris, a freshman lawmaker from Chandler, a suburb of Phoenix. This Chandler far-right Republican first surfaced in public view during the bad old days of the Arizona Senate’s now-infamous Cyber Ninja Audit, when she ran an absurd door knocking “canvass” and claimed to have found massive fraud in the 2020 election. A prominent supporter of discredited election conspiracies, she was also found by the House Ethics Committee to have engaged in "disorderly behavior" in violation of the chamber’s rules. All Democrats and most Republicans voted to expel Harris, getting the necessary two-thirds of the House to pass the resolution.

April 12, 2023: Ethics committee concludes Rep. Liz Harris broke Arizona House rules

Maricopa County appoints Julie Willoughby to House seat following Liz Harris' expulsion - KTAR.com

Maricopa County appoints Julie Willoughby to House seat following Liz Harris' expulsion.

Posted: Fri, 05 May 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]

But a video of her testimony exploded on the internet in the days following the hearing. As Harris left, the now ex-lawmaker called the ethics report "a lie," and said "God knows the truth." Prior to her expulsion, Harris represented the state's 13th Legislative District, which covers a portion of the East Valley. The Speaker of the State House, Republican Ben Toma, said Harris' expulsion is necessary, and taht she was held accountable for bad behavior. The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors will choose from a list of three candidates nominated by the GOP precinct committeemen in her district. A prominent supporter of discredited election conspiracies, she was also found by the House Ethics Committee to have engaged in “disorderly behavior” in violation of the chamber’s rules.

At that hearing, Ms. Breger falsely claimed that Katie Hobbs, a Democrat who was elected governor in November, and several other public officials and judges had accepted bribes from the Sinaloa drug cartel. Harris had told the ethics committee she was not aware of what Breger would present to the elections hearing, but the committee received a batch of text messages from an anonymous source that contradicted that claim. The committee found Harris knew of the bribery claims ahead of the hearing and did not comply with internal deadlines to show any presentations to House leaders, which could have flagged the presentation as out of bounds.

The expulsion vote took effect immediately, leaving a vacancy in the state house. Republican Precinct Committee members in District 13 will now select three Republican finalists to fill Harris’ seat. I think that the decision to expel,I know that there are a lot of precinct committeemen that are not happy with it,” said Sen. J.D. Mesnard, a Republican from Harris’ district. The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors will select one of the three finalists to serve the remainder of Harris’ term in office. They’re widely shared among right wing media figures and carry the imprimatur of an official legislative proceeding. Harris narrowly won her election in 2022 in a swing district in Phoenix’s suburbs.

Precinct committeemen in her district’s Republican party will now nominate three people who could replace Harris, with the Maricopa county board of supervisors deciding on the person who will take her spot. But not a lot of stuff because she was expelled from the Republican-controlled House just three months into her term. This, after she staged an all-day, livestreamed legislative hearing at which her witnesses talked about the many ways in which our elections were supposedly stolen. Rep. Liz Harris was found to have violated House rules by inviting a witness to present false charges about lawmakers and other state officials to a legislative committee. “Each member could make up their own mind on whether or not Representative Harris did in fact, not only perpetrate this to begin with, but then contradict herself numerous times during the ethics hearing process,” said Toma, one of the 46 lawmakers who voted to expel Harris.

Arizona House expels Republican Rep. Liz Harris for ethics violation

The Republican lawmaker represents the state's 3rd Legislative District, which covers a portion of Northeastern Maricopa County. Since making the statement, Harris has voted on 100 bills, despite the 2022 election never being redone. Democratic Rep. Stephanie Stahl Hamilton filed an ethics complaint against Harris on March 6, and the Ethics Committee held an evidentiary hearing on March 30. Eighteen Republicans, including Speaker Ben Toma and Majority Leader Leo Biasiucci, joined 28 Democrats in voting to oust Harris.

"In my discussions with Ms. Harris, she firmly believes her removal was improper and unlawful," said Supervisor Jack Sellers, who represents an area that includes the legislative district. "This board was not a party to that process but must give weight to an action that over two-thirds of the House members voted in favor of." “The members of the Ethics Committee unanimously found the fact-intensive evidence to show that Representative Harris engaged in disorderly behavior in violation of House Rule 1, thereby eroding the public trust in the legislative process,” the resolution said. “Harris engaged in disorderly behavior in violation of House Rule 1, thereby eroding the public trust in the legislative process,” the resolution calling for her expulsion read. Arizona Republican Liz Harris was expelled from the state House of Representatives for inviting a witness to present false charges about lawmakers and other state officials — and then lying about her involvement in the outrageous testimony. Thaler alleged, without reliable evidence, that two women working on behalf of the Sinaloa cartel used fraudulent mortgage documents to launder money to a wide range of officials, both Republicans and Democrats.

It just comes down to that simple principle,” said Rep. David Livingston, a Republican from Peoria. On Tuesday, the House Ethics Committee released a report saying Harris broke ethics rules when she invited a guest that made unsubstantiated claims at a February joint committee hearing. Harris, formerly R-District 13 in the East Valley, was expelled after a legislative ethics committee report found she damaged "the institutional integrity of the House" after she invited Jacqueline Breger to publicly speak before a group of lawmakers.