Public Corruption: Governor Ducey’s Bribery Of School Districts Is Malfeasance In Office

by

Governor Ducey and our lawless MAGA/Qanon Trump death cult GQP legislature lost in court, just as I said they should. Judge says law doesn’t yet block Phoenix Union mask mandate.

Nevertheless, our murderously incompetent governor persists. He is now using a “carrot and stick” approach in his executive orders that amounts to illegal bribery, which is malfeasance in office for which he should be removed from office, and prosecuted.

First, the stick. The Arizona Mirror reports, Ducey: Schools won’t get COVID aid money if they require masks:

A day after a judge ruled that a new state law barring Arizona public and charter schools from requiring mask use can’t be enforced until September 29, Gov. Doug Ducey on Tuesday said school districts considering enacting temporary mask mandates won’t receive some federal COVID-19 relief money unless they call off those plans.

And those who have already enacted mask mandates seemingly won’t be able to claim pandemic aid payments they were expecting.

This is unlawful, in violation of federal law.

The Arizona Capitol Times adds, AZ lawmakers seek review of Ducey’s use of federal funds:

Two Democratic members of the state’s congressional delegation are asking federal officials to review the legality of Gov. Doug Ducey using Covid relief dollars to benefit only schools that do not require masks.

In a letter Wednesday to Education Secretary Miguel Cardona, Rep. Raul Grijalva said the dollars from the American Rescue Plan that Ducey is using were intended to support states in their efforts to “reopen K-12 schools safely and equitably expand opportunities for students who need it most.” Yet what is happening, the congressman said, is the governor is punishing schools that actually follow the guidelines from the Centers for Disease Prevention and Control.

Those guidelines, issued in the wake of the spread of the Delta variant, recommend “universal indoor masking for all teachers, staff, students and visitors to K-12 schools, regardless of vaccination status.” And the CDC says children should return to full-time, in-person instruction “with layered prevention strategies in place.”

Instead, Ducey announced on Tuesday he is dividing up nearly $163 million in rescue plan dollars among schools — but only those schools that do not have a mask mandate in place as of Aug. 27. And the governor set that date for compliance even though a judge ruled just a day earlier that the legislative ban on mask mandates does not take effect until Sept. 29.

“Gov. Ducey is yet again pursuing reckless and inhumane proposals that will continue to exacerbate this public health crisis,” Grijalva wrote. “In addition, it puts into question the legality around him restricting public health mitigation measures in the first place.”

Rep. Greg Stanton, in a separate letter to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, said he already is sure that Ducey is acting illegally.

“This deeply irresponsible plan appears to violate the plain language of the law as written by Congress as well as the guidance issued by the Department of the Treasury,” he wrote. “These funds are not intended to be used for policies that undercut scientific research to pursue purely partisan ideological priorities.”

And Stanton wants action.

“I urge the Treasury Department to make clear to the governor that if he follows through with this reckless proposal, he risks losing these funds for Arizona,” he said.

The Arizona Mirror continues:

“We have grave concerns about how the money is being used. This is not what Congress intended,” said Richie Taylor, a spokesman for Governor Ducey’s own Arizona Department of Education.

[T]he threat of losing federal aid only applies to 155 of the state’s 732 districts and charter schools — and more than 80% of those who face the prospect of losing money that Congress and the Biden administration intended to mitigate the effects of the coronavirus pandemic are charter schools.

The $163 million that Ducey is dangling in front of those 155 school districts and charter schools was sent to Arizona as part of the American Rescue Plan, the latest round of COVID-19 stimulus aid. The money is aimed at ensuring school districts and charter schools that didn’t qualify for aid in earlier relief packages aren’t left behind, and is limited to those that didn’t already receive at least $1,800 per student.

Taylor said it is mostly smaller charter schools and school districts with low poverty rates that were counting on money from the Education Plus-Up Grant Program that Ducey’s office has been designing for months.

An analysis of the eligible schools by the Arizona Mirror found only 25 traditional public school districts among the 155 eligible educational entities. Another four were vocational or technical education districts, while the rest are charter schools.

Among those expecting an Education Plus-Up grant are seven districts or charters that the Department of Education says have instituted mask mandates for in-person learning[.]

Those districts and schools are:

      • Arizona School For The Arts
      • Catalina Foothills Unified District
      • Khalsa Family Services
      • Kyrene Elementary District
      • Madison Elementary District
      • Northland Preparatory Academy
      • Tempe Union High School District

There were some 20 school districts and charter schools that had enacted mask mandates prior to Monday’s ruling on the belief that the new law couldn’t block them from doing so until late September. After the ruling, several others implemented their own masking requirements.

Howard Fischer reports, President says feds will take action against governors who ban school mask mandates:

President Biden directed the nation’s top education official to take action “against governors that are trying to block and intimidate local school officials and educators” by prohibiting them from requiring the use of masks.

Biden said he expects Cardona to use “all of his oversight authority and legal action if appropriate” to bring errant states into line.

“We’re not going to sit by as governors try to block and intimidate educators who protect our children,” the president said in an announcement from the White House.

[In] his letter, obtained by Capitol Media Services, the education secretary said it is a “shared priority” that students be able to return to in-person instruction safely.

“Arizona’s actions to block school districts from voluntarily adopting science-based strategies for preventing the spread of COVID-19 that are aligned with the guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention puts these goals at risk,” Cardona said in the letter. The education secretary also said the policies and laws barring school districts from requiring those on campus to wear masks may conflict with their authority to protect students and staffers.

And Cardona, in a separate blog post, left no doubt that this warning is more than a hollow threat, saying his agency’s Office of Civil Rights may initiate a directed investigation “if facts indicate a potential violation of the rights of students as a result of state policies and actions.”

What makes that important is that Cardona is enlarging the scope of what fits under those rules of how schools must act to protect the civil rights of students and teachers.

“We’re expanding that to violations of safety,” Vanessa Harmoush, a spokeswoman for the agency, told Capitol Media Services.

“So if a parent or teacher or student feels like they aren’t able to be safe in schools because of certain laws put in place, they can file a complaint,” she said. “We can pursue the investigation and kind of go from there.”

And a finding against the state could result in legal action to forbid the state from enforcing the newly approved law banning mask mandates.

Governor Ducey, who controls the American Rescue Plan Covid relief funds, is effectively engaging in illegal bribery under A.R.S.§ 13-2602:

Bribery of a public servant or party officer; classification

A. A person commits bribery of a public servant or party officer if with corrupt intent:

1. Such person offers, confers or agrees to confer any benefit upon a public servant or party officer with the intent to influence the public servant’s or party officer’s vote, opinion, judgment, exercise of discretion or other action in his official capacity as a public servant or party officer; or

* * *

C. Bribery of a public servant or party officer is a class 4 felony.

The Associated Press reports on the “carrot” portion of Gov. Ducey’s illegal bribery scheme:

Ducey also created a $10 million grant program [Where did he get the funds? From federal Covid relief aid?] that largely mirrors the state’s private school voucher program by awarding parents $7,000 for each student if their public school required isolating or quarantining due to COVID-19 exposure, or if it mandated masks or gave preferential treatment to vaccinated children.

“Our COVID-19 Educational Recovery Benefit will empower parents to exercise their choice when it comes to their child’s education and COVID-19 mitigation strategies,” he said.

Arizona’s GOP-led Legislature this year rejected an expansion of the voucher program that now gives about 10,000 students public cash to attend private schools. Students who do not have special needs get 90% of the state funding, about $7,000 each, that would have gone to their local public school to pay for private school tuition or other costs.

The governor’s moves come as an increasing number of school districts defy the provision in the newly enacted state budget that [would] ban mask mandates and instead follow recommendations from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention regarding face coverings. Gov. Ducey and MAGA/QAnon Trump death cult Republicans who control the Legislature crafted the state’s restrictions [which do not go into effect until September 29.]

Democratic House Minority Leader Reginald Bolding said Ducey was creating his own “Hunger Games” for Arizona schools with his actions.

Bribery constitutes malfeasance in office, which is “an unlawful act carried out while acting under one’s official capacity. Malfeasance in office affects the performance of a person’s official duty. It is also known as official misconduct. An act of malfeasance in office can cause the removal of an elected official by statute or recall election.” [Or impeachment, which is a meaningless remedy when all of the Republicans in the legislature are co-conspirators and aiders and abettors.]

I have argued from the start that Gov. Ducey’s grossly incompetent mishandling of the Coronavirus pandemic in Arizona, in fact adopting policies in direct contravention of federal public health guidelines and best practices, directly resulting in the unnecessary deaths of thousands of Arizonans constitutes “criminal negligence.”

Criminal negligence means that an individual fails to realize that there is a considerable risk that the act being committed can result in serious harm or death to another person. This means that while the person did not intend to cause death, his or her conduct was a behavior of the kind that a reasonable person would not have done because that reasonable person would be aware of the risks the conduct would cause to other people.

This standard is clearly met by the facts. The Associated Press continues:

Arizona has seen coronavirus cases surge in the last six weeks, and numerous school districts have had large outbreaks. State health officials on Tuesday reported 2,661 cases and three deaths from the virus.

In all, the Arizona Department of Health Services has reported more than 970,523 cases and 18,467 deaths from the virus since the pandemic began. Only Fifty-four percent of the 7.1 million Arizona people living in the state have been vaccinated [well below the national average.]

Five districts, two in metro Tucson and three in the Phoenix area, opted to require students and staff to wear masks after a judge ruled Monday that the budget law does not go into effect until Sept, 29. A teacher who filed a lawsuit challenging a mask mandate at a Phoenix district argued it took effect after lawmakers approved it in late June.

In all, at least 16 districts in Arizona are requiring students and staff to wear masks while indoors amid fears over the delta variant.

12 News in Phoenix adds, ‘They literally can’t be vaccinated’: Kindergartener tests positive for COVID-19 as Arizona ranks 2nd among pandemic-related deaths (excerpt):

Arizona ranks second for COVID-19 related deaths among children

Data collected by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association found that Arizona currently ranks second in COVID-19 related deaths with 34 among people 19 years old and younger. Texas has the highest number. 

On Tuesday, Banner Health Chief Clinical Officer Dr. Marjorie Bessel told reporters that Arizona’s largest healthcare provider has seen a 95% increase in COVID-19 cases. Five percent were among pediatrics.

“We have seen an unusual surge of RSV disease within our pediatric population,” said Dr. Bessel. “That makes us concerned about the upcoming winter.”

The American Academy of Pediatrics also reported a sharp increase in pediatric cases from last week. More than 71,000 new cases among kids were reported, up 84% from the week prior and five times the amount since the end of June.

Arizona schools need to be able to mandate masks and vaccination in order to protect children, teachers, and staff.

Gov. Ducey and our lawless MAGA/QAnon Trump death cult legislature are doing just the opposite, in defiance of federal law and federal public health guidelines.

A political party that is willing to use innocent children as pawns in their insane death cult, and to sacrifice the health, safety, and lives of innocent children, including their own, is a public health menace that must be removed from power in the best interests of Arizonans.

Governor Doug Ducey should resign or be impeached for public corruption, i.e., bribery and malfeasance in office. All of the lawless MAGA/QAnon Trump death cult Republicans in the legislature should be removed from office with him.