Does Ken Bennett Support Look Ahead Arizona’s Aims and Methods?

Ken Bennett must disassociate from Look Ahead America and publicly denounce them or he is supporting their lies and disinformation campaign to undermine the 2020 election.

Ed.: This article is part of a series regarding Ken Bennett’s role and public statements about the #AZFraudit, please consider reading the others: “Bennett’s Bottom Line: No Evidence Supports Trump’s Lie That He Won AZ“; “Ken Bennett’s ‘Concerns’ about Maricopa’s Administration of the 2020 Election Give Fuel to Conspiracies and Lies“; and “Some of Ken Bennett’s Suggestions for Improvements to AZ Election Audit Laws Are Sensible and Non-Partisan Reforms“

I have a few thoughts about Ken Bennett as a tragic figure. But those thoughts don’t necessarily mean that Bennett isn’t also a villain: really, only Bennett will be able to decide that matter one way or the other by his actions going forward.

The recent passing of the widely-respected Colin Powell puts me in mind of how a good man’s reputation for honesty and integrity, built over a lifetime of public service can be betrayed and misused by those he (wrongly) trusts. Just as Dubya cravenly used Powell’s sterling reputation to lie to America and the world about WMD in Iraq to launch a baseless and stupid war that killed thousands, and cost America dearly in lives and treasure, I believe that Ken Bennett was similarly used and betrayed by Senate President Karen Fann into lending his credibility and reputation to a fundamentally dishonest undertaking.

Bennett told the small crowd about how he came to be the Senate Liaison to the #AZFraudit.

[Editorial note: The video may still be processed on YouTube upon publication, so I have provided an AI-generated transcript of the clip below, and the full unedited videos of Bennett’s presentation and Q and A is available here.]

Braynard: What, um, what authority did you have over the budget over how the audit was conducted over how the reports were bought over the data, and how it was managed over, who was hired to do the audit? Could you fire people? Did you have any kind of authority whatsoever over this process?

Bennett: No, no authority.

Braynard: Okay.

Bennett: I made the mistake of asking, I’ve known Senate president Fann. Who’s also from Prescott for most of my adult life, having been a Senate president like her, but also having been a secretary of state. I made the mistake of calling her one day and said, I saw the Senate and the county board of supervisors fighting. I said, if there’s anything I can do to help them, she said, would you be the Senate liaison, but I had no authority over any of the things that you talked to.

He has known Fann his entire adult life. He came up in politics and worked with her his whole career. He trusted her. He wanted to help her. And when he asked her what he could do to help her in the difficult position she was in with national figures and the White House pressing for the Arizona Senate to ‘do something’ about Biden’s victory in Arizona, Fann asked him to be the ‘Senate Liaison’ to the ‘audit’ she was launching using the Cyber Ninjas.

He trusted the wrong person, and he’s been sucked into lending his credibility and reputation to a misguided and fundamentally dishonest enterprise that has fundamentally harmed and undermined American democracy and Arizona’s reputation. Just like Colin Powell; he was made a dupe. He was given no powers: he could not set the agenda, order anyone to do anything, hire or fire, direct a budget, or control any expenditure or fundraising.

He made the “mistake” of getting stuck with the unenviable task of painting lipstick on the Cyber Pig. He tried to be honest and fairly report on what was going on in the ‘audit’, but he was given responsibility with utterly no power, and his impotence combined with his fundamental decency led to his expulsion from the ‘audit’. He was used and abused, and discarded. You will note that in the video and transcript, that Bennett beings to characterize himself as having made a “mistake”. I think he knows he’s been had.

Now, don’t take any of this as evidence that I agree with Bennett politically in pretty much any way: I certainly don’t. Even now, he professes himself a “big fan” of the twice-impeached, deeply corrupt, and flagrantly mentally unfit election loser, Trump. Nor do I approve of the vast majority of the policies Bennett pursued using his various elected offices. He’s a solid conservative and I believe his political philosophy and policy priorities to be largely harmful to society. But, I believe he’s a sincere, decent, and honest person who happens to believe some bad ideas about how societies flourish and how best government should support that flourishing.

I think Bennet is a likable and earnest guy, and I actually feel sorry for him.

A few thoughts about the organization, Look Ahead Arizona, sponsoring this AZ tour

Bennett has associated himself with a deeply dishonest and corrupt organization, Look Ahead America, whose local project Look Ahead Arizona, is sponsoring this tour of the state using Bennett as the headliner.

I am shocked and saddened to see Bennett co-operating with this dog and pony tour put on by the utterly corrupt Look Ahead America, an organization whose stated aim is to manufacture evidence of ‘voter fraud’ to question the outcome of 2020 election and sow enough doubt and disinformation to make it possible to assert that the outcome of the election cannot be known. I’m not making this aim up; it’s merely what the spokesman of the organization sponsoring Bennett’s tour stated outright.

The ‘mission’ of this organization is fundamentally the same as Trump’s dishonest lawyers following the election: spin lies, rumors, and disinformation into a narrative of massive fraud. The Director of this scam, Mr. Braynard, even admits when I confront him, he’s using the same debunked lies from the same unreliable sources for which Trump’s lawyers are being disciplined and disbarred for using in court.

This misinformation campaign failed in Trump’s many post-election lawsuits because, in court, when you lie, you will have to eventually back it up with actual evidence and witnesses who must swear to their testimony under penalty of perjury. That’s what tripped them up. The judges weren’t a gullible or delusional audience; they demanded proof and Trumpies couldn’t produce any. So Look Ahead America are simply (and admittedly) repurposing those same lies and bullshit gathered by Trump’s lawyers after the election about massive voter fraud and selling it to a willing and eager audience of Trump rubes, who will certainly pony up their hard-earned cash and work for free to help spread those lies.

When I confronted this huckster about the basis of his claims at the end of the above video, he choked and fled.

His attempted defense? His witness, Mr. Garrett, can’t be possibly just be lying, because it wouldn’t ‘possible’ for him to have voted. [your narrator stares into the camera for a minute to let that nonsense sink in…]

Could ANYONE take such an assertion seriously? The obvious conclusion to anyone with an open mind, and not blinded by motivated reasoning, is that Mr. Garrett simply voted twice: once in person, in TN, and once by mail, in AZ. He was discovered and is now lying about it. Why be so public about it? To establish his alibi and eventual defense.

The Right-Wing Media has seized upon this utterly transparent lie Dehshon Garrett is telling to cover his butt when he was noticed committing voter fraud. Mr. Garrett even went on Laura Ingram’s show to pedal his obvious lie and get his version out ahead of the Grand Jury. As a trained cross-examiner, it is utterly transparent to me that Mr. Garrett is lying. And I don’t think it even takes any training or experience to see that. Just watch the video.

AG Brnovich should certainly be investigating the case of Mr. Garrett – for having voted illegally in Arizona. Mr. Garrett’s case is not evidence of a vast shadowy conspiracy to cast illegal mail-in ballots, as Ingram and Braynard are spinning it, it’s merely evidence that Mr. Garrett committed a crime by voting twice and is now lying about it. Mr. Garrett certainly has the best possible motive to lie – one that I saw every day as a prosecutor: to cover up having committed a serious crime.

Mr. Braynard’s only defense to the obvious conclusion that Garrett voted twice illegally and is lying about it, is lamely to point out Garrett’s assertions must be true because he went on TV to tell his lie, and the utterly implausible assertion that it’s simply “not possible” that Mr. Garrett voted twice. Why not? It’s not just obvious he did so, I can think of at least a dozen ways he carried out his crime.

Is Braynard really that credulous, or does he believe everyone else is? Notice how he quickly gets away from me before I can humiliate him any further at the end of the video? Also classic behavior of a liar: tell your implausible fib and run away.

That such obvious shysters are now chumming the waters with such utterly moronic lies and conspiracies tells me the scum-sucking bottom feeders like Mr. Braynard are moving in on the remaining schools of rubes in Trump’s wake to see if they might squeeze just one more yacht out of this particular grift.

My unsolicited advice to Ken Bennett: don’t just walk away from these people – run. Look Ahead America and Arizona are exploiters, liars, and con-men – nothing more. Preserve what’s left of your dignity and cut your losses now, Ken. If you don’t denounce them and quit participating with these villains, we are all going to have to assume you approve of their dishonest scheme to undermine our elections.