QAnon Queen Sen. Kelly Townsend Calls On GQP ‘Vigilantes’ To Spy On Early Voters

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Ladies and Gentleman, your GQP Sedition Caucus in the Arizona Legislature on a Tuesday afternoon when they had nothing better to do with their time than to watch a bad fascist propaganda film.

The Arizona Mirror reports, GOP lawmaker calls on ‘vigilantes’ to film and follow voters to combat unproven ‘ballot mules’:

The QAnon Queen and white Christian Nationalist, Sen. Kelly Townsend, R-Apache Junction, called on “vigilantes” to spy on people who deposit early ballots in ballot drop boxes for elections later this year, imploring them to use hidden cameras and follow voters to their cars in an effort to stamp out unproven fraud alleged by a conservative group that aims to restrict voting.

If one of you fascist “vigilantes” follows me to my car, I am going to go all Walter Sobchak on your sorry ass. Fair warning, I don’t suffer fascists.

“We’re going to have hidden trail cameras, we are going to have people parked out there watching you and they are going to follow you to your car and get your license plate, so don’t try it. Don’t try it anymore,” Townsend added.

True the Vote’s claims are at the center of “2000 Mules,” a flawed film by [convicted criminal, pardoned by Donald Trump so that he could be his Leni Riefenstahl] provocateur conservative filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza. In the legislative hearing Tuesday, the organization gave a lengthy presentation on its Arizona-based findings, claiming to have found alleged “mules” that had aided in alleged ballot collection or other unspecified nefarious acts.

True The Vote is the GQP’s voter suppression operation, with a “horrendous record of filing inaccurate voter registration challenges.” It has been accused of voter intimidation and advancing hysterical claims about the pervasiveness of voter fraud.

An analysis of the film’s claims by the Associated Press found numerous problems with the data analysis that D’Souza and True the Vote performed to reach their conclusions. For instance, there is no accounting for people with multiple mobile devices that could create pings in the geolocation data or people who are elections or campaign workers who would drive by areas where drop boxes are located on a regular basis. Other fact-checkers (Politifact) have also done independent analysis of the claims and found them to be fundamentally flawed (Washington Post), see also, A Big Lie in a New Package (New York Times).

UPDATE:

D’Souza and True the Vote have previously erroneously claimed that their work and the film had spurred real world action when it had not. The filmmakers had said the Yuma sheriff was investigating because of their film, but the sheriff has said that is unequivocally false.

See, The Yuma sheriff isn’t investigating election fraud because of ‘2000 Mules’.

Townsend had also requested that anyone watching who was an alleged “ballot mule” come forward as a whistleblower to the Arizona Senate which would offer them protection for information. [Nut Job…] The Arizona Senate is not a law enforcement agency.

Townsend’s call for vigilante action could lead to violence [incitement], as happened in 2020 when a private investigator and former police officer hired by a far-right activist to discover the source of supposed fraudulent ballots intentionally crashed his car into a van in Texas and then held the driver — an air conditioner repairman — at gunpoint, wrongly believing he was transporting boxes of ballots.

The hearing Tuesday was full of election fraud conspiracy theories and other conspiracy theories — even before the hearing formally began.

Right Side Broadcasting Network, a pro-Trump network that constantly is dodging violations of YouTube’s Terms of Service for misinformation, interviewed a litany of prominent members of the Arizona GOP before live-streaming the hearing. 

This should be disqualifying from office for anyone who participated in this fascist film festival. Do we have a list of attendees?

“They were pumping fraudulent ballots in,” claimed gubernatorial candidate “Krazy Kari” Lake. There is no evidence of fraudulent ballots in the 2020 election. Lake also claimed that President Joe Biden was not the “legitimate president” due to the “stolen election,” an assertion that has no basis in fact and has been rejected by dozens of courts.

Arizona Republican Party Chairwoman “Chemtrails” Kelli Ward also echoed many of Lake’s sentiments, sharing multiple other unsubstantiated claims and went off on her fellow Republicans who did not share her beliefs.

“They are liars, they are cheaters and they want to steal another election,” Ward told RBSN about fellow Republicans who believe Biden won the election. She added that the “mules” were members of “antifa” and “BLM,” presenting no evidence to prove her claim.

The hearing itself started with a prayer for “election integrity” (sic) that mentioned a conspiracy theory rooted in antisemitism.

“They seek to bring ‘globalism,’ they seek to destroy our constitution,” Townsend said during the opening prayer for the hearing. “Shine a light on what has happened in Arizona and reveal the things that happened in Arizona.”

The globalist conspiracy theory is a far-right conspiracy theory with roots in antisemitism and is also often connected to the idea of a “New World Order” and a one-world government, most often with the Jewish people at the center of the conspiracy.

Among the crowd was a woman in an InfoWars shirt. The website is one of the biggest pushers of the globalist conspiracy theory and many other conspiracy theories, including hateful and antisemitic ones.

True the Vote’s presentation was largely critical of fact-checkers who have pointed out the flaws in their data analysis and the holes in their own statements. [How dare you point out that we are full o’ shit!]

The presentation also got basic information on elections in Arizona incorrect.

Gregg Phillips, True the Vote’s election “expert” (sic) and a long-time Republican operative, claimed that Arizona counties only collect year of birth voter registration on forms, making it impossible to correctly identify voters. But this is not true: elections officials have every voter’s full date of birth, but only the year is made public.

Phillips and True the Vote’s founder, Catherine Engelbrecht, would not release the name of the non-profit organizations they claimed were paying “mules” to rig the election. Nor would they say how they came to do their data analysis, claiming it was “proprietary.”

Multiple attempts to contact the Attorney General’s Office to confirm claims made by websites that True the Vote has been “working” with the AG’s office and that data from the organization has been handed over to be used in prosecutions went unreturned.

Rep. Quang Nguyen, R-Prescott Valley, asked the duo point blank if they had met with the AG or handed any information over.

Phillips said they had met with the AG’s office about a year ago and said they are scheduled to meet with the office again Wednesday morning. Phillips also claimed to have handed the information over to the FBI.

As the hearing wrapped up, more elected officials continued to spread unfounded accusations about the 2020 election, including some running for higher office.

State Rep. Shawnna Bolick
State Rep. Shawnna Bolick

“We do know that the election officials colluded with the judicial officials in 2020,” Rep. Shawnna Bolick, R-Phoenix, said, adding that they changed election procedures “under the guise” of COVID-19. Election procedures in Arizona were not changed during the pandemic.

Bolick, who is running for secretary of state, organized the hearing Tuesday and also encouraged Phillips to repeat himself earlier in the hearing when he called fact-checkers “journalistic terrorists.”

Have I mentioned that Eva Braun, er, Shawna Bolick is the wife of an Arizona Supreme Court Justice? She was previously caught up in the scandle of another wife of a Supreme Court Justice, Ginny Thomas. Rep. Shawnna Bolick – Running For Secretary Of State – Aided And Abetted The Trump Coup Plot.

Ward, the leader of the state GOP, seized on the comment, calling journalists covering the hearing “terrorists.” 

“The mainstream media is Domestic Terrorists,” the Arizona GOP Twitter account tweeted a few minutes later. That tweet was later deleted.

No, that would be the violent MAGA/QAnon seditious insurrectionists who sacked the Capitol on January 6, 2021 are the domestic terrorists, and all those who support and give aid and comfort to these traitorous “J6” criminals, including you Coup Plotter fake GQP elector “Chemtrails” Kelli Ward.





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3 thoughts on “QAnon Queen Sen. Kelly Townsend Calls On GQP ‘Vigilantes’ To Spy On Early Voters”

  1. Ahem…. “Or the Sharpie stealing votes conspiracy that wasn’t a conspiracy.”

    Anyway, these people are literally crazy.

    It comes from their brains trying to make Christianity, America First, and Capitalism all fit together.

    They are three opposites.

    Jesus said sell your house to feed the poor, and you go to the bad place if you don’t welcome immigrants.

    So there goes your capitalism and America First foolishness right out the door.

    Probably the same door that’s been responsible for all the mass shootings.

    Because doors cause child murders not guns.

    See there, the list of things in their brains making them crazy is pretty long.

    It would all be very sad if they weren’t in positions of power while at the same time lacking the ability to think.

  2. In a pair of opinions, Laurie Roberts writes, “Arizona Legislature has time for ‘2000 Mules’ but not for a fiscal 2023 budget”, https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/laurieroberts/2022/05/31/arizona-legislature-has-time-2000-mules-but-not-budget/7456056001/

    In just 30 days, the state of Arizona will run out of money.

    In just 30 days, the people who teach our kids and patrol our highways and run our prisons and inspect our nursing homes and investigate complaints of child abuse and on and on and on won’t be able to do their jobs any longer.

    That’s because the Arizona Legislature — now 141 days into what is supposed to be a 100-day session — hasn’t approved a budget for the coming fiscal year. Hasn’t even held so much as a single hearing to get public comment on a proposed budget.

    [Note to Laurie: They NEVER hold public hearings to take testimony from the public on the budget. It would not matter. The deal has been cut in a smoke filled room in the dark.]

    Meanwhile, on Tuesday afternoon our leaders will somehow find the time to hold a hearing on “2000 Mules,” the Dinesh D’Souza documentary that claims to have uncovered a massive conspiracy to steal the 2020 election — without actually providing actual, you know, proof of a conspiracy.

    Sort of like the Dominion Voting Systems ballot switching conspiracy that wasn’t a conspiracy.

    Or the graveyards full of dead voters conspiracy that wasn’t a conspiracy.

    Or the Sharpie stealing votes conspiracy that wasn’t a conspiracy.

    Or the bamboo ballots conspiracy that wasn’t, well, you get the picture.

    True the Vote investigators will present their findings of supposed ballot harvesting to Republican legislators in the Arizona Senate.

    “The claims made in the movie ‘2000 Mules’ are pretty incredible, and it is important that Arizona follows up on this information … ,” Senate Elections Committee Chairwoman Kelly Townsend told the Arizona Daily Independent.

    “I look forward to asking questions next week and I hope that we get to the bottom of this issue so that we can restore voter confidence.”

    And here I thought Senate President Karen Fann’s audit, conducted by hand-picked Trump supporters, was supposed to “restore voter confidence”?

    Alas, the Senate audit showed that a hand count of the paper ballots matched the machine count and that not only did Joe Biden win Maricopa County, he actually won by a larger margin than previously thought.

    ‘2000 Mules’ provides no evidence for its claims

    As blockbusters go, “2000 Mules” is more donkey droppings than it is evidence of a conspiracy.

    Numerous fact checkers have called the documentary’s analysis – that ballot drop boxes in Arizona and other swing states were stuffed with pro-Biden ballots – flawed.

    The movie alleges that more than 200 “mules” worked in Maricopa and Yuma counties, making an average of 20 trips each to ballot drop boxes, dropping off an average of five ballots per trip for a total of 20,000 votes.

    All that’s missing is, you know, any actual evidence.

    The documentary provides no evidence that anyone made more than one trip to a ballot box. No evidence of any conspiracy to stuff ballot boxes. No evidence that all those supposedly phony ballots were for Biden.

    So naturally, the Republican-run Arizona Legislature is dropping everything to hold a hearing on Tuesday afternoon. Hosting the event with Townsend: Rep. Shawnna Bolick, who is running for secretary of state, hoping Arizona voters will put her in charge of running the 2024 elections.

    Look for all of the Legislature’s biggest conspiracy kooks to be there.

    Meanwhile, the state budget …

    Laurie Robers follows up with, “Forget ‘2000 Mules’ nonsense. Here are 6 things the Arizona Legislature should do in June”, https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/laurieroberts/2022/06/01/forget-2000-mules-nonsense-here-six-things-arizona-legislature-should-do-june/7470204001/

    With just 29 days to go until Arizona government grinds to a halt due to lack of a budget, the Republican-run Arizona Legislature on Tuesday held a hearing on the latest in election conspiracy theories.

    All the gang was there, with lots of talk about “domestic terrorists” (read: journalists) and “liars and cheaters” (read: Republicans who don’t believe the 2020 election was stolen). Republican gubernatorial hopeful Kari Lake and state GOP Chairwoman Kelli Ward were there, doing stand-up routines for RSBN, which live streamed the event on its YouTube channel.

    There was a stunning presentation by True the Vote on its “2000 Mules” film, wherein its creators demonstrated their keen lack of understanding of how elections work in Arizona and outlined an elaborate scheme in which unnamed nonprofits dispatched “mules” to systematically stuff ballot drop boxes in Maricopa and Yuma counties.

    All that was lacking was actual evidence.

    The week ends with embarassing claims

    There was a call by Rep. Walt Blackman, a Snowflake Republican now running for Congress, to pass House Bill 2289, requiring that all ballots be hand counted and the results reported within 24 hours of an election – a feat that Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richter has estimated would take about 2.2 million man hours. Or put another way, 93 days assuming you have 1,000 workers to count the 60 or so contests on the ballot.

    And lest I forget, there was Sen. Kelly Townsend’s call for vigilantes to stake out ballot drop boxes during this year’s elections.

    “I have been so pleased to hear about all you vigilantes out there that want to camp out at these drop boxes,” Townsend, the Apache Junction Republican who chairs the Senate Elections Committee, said at the end of the nearly two-hour hearing.

    “We’re going to have hidden trail cameras, we are going to have people parked out there watching you and they are going to follow you to your car and get your license plate, so don’t try it. Don’t try it anymore.”

    And with that, the embarrassment that is the Arizona Legislature called it a week. They are in recess until next Monday, at which time they will presumably enter into Month Six of doing absolutely nothing to advance this state.

    Or they could declare June the month of the open mind.

    6 better ways to spend the rest of the session

    Being the optimist that I am, I still see an opportunity here for our Legislature to rescue itself. After five months of inter- and intra-party warfare, wouldn’t it be nice to see these people – most of whom will be seeking our vote on Aug. 2 and Nov. 8 – emerge from their respective foxholes and get to work for the people of Arizona?

    Not just the diehards who turn out in primaries, but all 7.2 million of us? The third of us who are Republicans but also the two-thirds of us who are not?

    Wouldn’t it be nice if our leaders treated middle ground as the promised land rather than scorched earth?

    To that end, here are my suggestions for how our leaders should spend June:

    Pass a budget that boosts school spending

    Both public opinion polls and recent elections have told us that Arizona voters want better funded schools. No longer are they content for an investment in our children that ranks 48th in the nation. Two years ago, they tried to raise income taxes on the rich, to raise close to a billion dollars for the schools. But it backfired when the courts ruled Proposition 208 unconstitutional. Meanwhile, a sizable number of Arizonans, including all of the rich ones, declared it unfair for voters to stick other people with a tax increase they themselves weren’t willing to pay.

    It’s a fair point. It is also a fair point to note that we are fundamentally failing the 1.1 million children who attend Arizona’s public schools and our kids don’t have time to wait for the adults to fix it.

    The Legislature knows what the people want and with a $5.2 billion budget surplus, they can deliver it without sticking it to rich people. Our leaders should approve major new funding for schools out of that budget surplus.

    And while they’re at it, they should lift or at least ask voters to reform the antiquated school spending limit that is wholly inadequate for 21st century schools.

    Prioritize school safety

    Don’t arm teachers. They’re already armed up their eyebrows with overcrowded classrooms full of students who often can’t do grade-level work and an ever-lengthening list of legislative decrees about how and what they must – and must not – teach.

    Besides that, with the responsibility of carrying a gun comes the responsibility of knowing how to use it and training regularly for that adrenaline pumping moment when the shooting begins.

    In short, teachers should teach. And every school should have a fully trained police officer whose sole job is to guard against becoming the next Sandy Hook or Uvalde. Use some of that state budget surplus to station a fully trained, well-armed, sworn officer in every public school in the state – one who is ready, willing and able to do battle should that awful day arrive.

    On guns

    We know that Democrats want to grab all the guns and Republicans want to arm every newborn. Neither is going to happen, so let’s look to see what is possible.

    Pass a red flag law. I don’t know of a single person, left or right, who believes that guns belong in the hands of people who are mentally unstable.

    After the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School massacre in 2018, Gov. Doug Ducey proposed a red flag law, only to watch it die at the hands of both Republicans and Democrats (one side thought it was too strict, the other too loose). After the El Paso Walmart massacre in 2019, Ducey tried again with no better luck.

    After Uvalde, and yet another classroom of dead children, can our leaders really do nothing?

    Pass a bill that allows a parent or a police officer to petition a court to temporarily seize the weapons of a person who they believe poses a danger to themselves or others. Make sure they can’t legally buy a weapon until they’ve been cleared to do so.

    Strengthen background checks. A red flag law is no good if you seize a guy’s weapon, only to have him pick up a replacement online or at his neighborhood gun show. The vast majority of Americans believe that a person buying a gun ought to first pass a background check. It’s time that our leaders listened to them.

    Bar the sale of high-capacity magazines. Jared Lee Loughner pumped 31 rounds into the crowd that gathered outside a Tucson-area Safeway to see then-Rep. Gabby Giffords one Saturday morning in 2011. When he paused to reload, bystanders jumped him, limiting the carnage to six dead and 13 injured. In Uvalde, there are reports that investigators counted at least seven 30-round magazines in the shooter’s backpack.

    Pass a law banning or at least better regulating the sale of these high-capacity bullet holders built to boost the body count. Give a kid a chance by forcing the shooter to reload.

    Put an age restriction on AR-15s. Buffalo, El Paso, a church in Sutherland Springs,Texas, a synagogue in Pittsburgh, Penn., a concert in Las Vegas, Sandy Hook, Marjory Stoneman Douglas, Robb Elementary School. AR-15-style semiautomatic rifles are the weapon of choice for mass shooters, the vast majority of whom seem to be young men.

    It’s easy to see why. Their bullets fly fast and with devastating impact, perfect for your rank-and-rile massacre.

    Pass a bill that bars or at least better regulates the sale of these assault-style weapons to 18- through 21-year-olds, maybe one that requires an enhanced evaluation before they can buy one.

    Oh, I know. Some courts have said such a ban would be unconstitutional. Then again, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that laws banning abortion are unconstitutional and we all know where that’s headed.

    You, dear leaders, can do it. Or, you can do nothing. Again, that is.

    And before you go there, yes. I know that we will never spend enough on schools to satisfy the teacher’s union. But it’s indisputable that we’re spending far too little right now and really, how long are today’s children supposed to wait?

    And yes, I know that we will never stop these massacres that occur now with appalling regularity, that evil will always exist. But can’t we at least try to slow it down?

    If your child is the one who is spared, wouldn’t it be worth it?

  3. The lunatics took over the asylum again on Wednesday. Dillon Rosenblatt tweets, https://twitter.com/DillonReedRose/status/1532053579271327744?cxt=HHwWgMCqlZ-n-cIqAAAA

    Arizona Rep. Neal Carter just tried to suspend House rules to vote on HCR2033 which would “decertify” the 2020 electors. House Majority Leader Ben Toma substituted a motion to adjourn and won. House is adjourned until Monday.

    Jermy Duda explains, https://twitter.com/jeremyduda/status/1532056596062187520?cxt=HHwWgMClgezW-sIqAAAA

    The legislature could pass a resolution, but it wouldn’t do anything. You can’t decertify a presidential election after the fact. The Electoral College has voted and Congress certified those votes. It can’t be undone.

    As Dillon Rosenblatt tweets, https://twitter.com/DillonReedRose/status/1532053941734608897?cxt=HHwWgsCg3au8-cIqAAAA

    The sky is blue, Arizona is hot, Biden is still president and there’s no such thing as decertification. Happy Wednesday

    State Rep. Andres Cano tweeted, https://twitter.com/AndresCanoAZ/status/1532055748246507527

    Not fake news: an Arizona GOP legislator just made a motion to waive the State House rules and immediately vote to decertify the 2020 electors. Give it a damn rest, guys. Get real.

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