Attorney General Kris Mayes has ended her investigation into president-elect Donald Trump over his speech.
Mayes began an investigation into Trump over his argument that former congresswoman Liz Cheney should have to fight in a war before advocating for bringing the U.S. into another one. Mayes claimed to the Arizona Republic that this recent change of heart from her office came from their sudden realization that Trump’s remarks were protected by the First Amendment.
During a Halloween day event in Arizona, Trump had called Cheney a “radical war hawk” and a “deranged person” whose desires for war were rooted in her lack of intimate understanding of it. The topic of her had come up after conservative pundit Tucker Carlson had asked the president-elect how he felt about Cheney campaigning against him despite her father, Dick Cheney, having been a Republican and former vice president.
“Let’s put her with a rifle standing there with nine barrels shooting at her, OK?” said Trump. “Let’s see how she feels about it. You know, when the guns are trained on her face. They’re all war hawks when they’re sitting in Washington in a nice building saying ‘Oh gee, let’s send 10,000 troops into the mouths of the enemies.’ She always wanted to go to war with people.”
Cheney responded by calling Trump a “dictator” who had threatened her life.
“This is how dictators destroy free nations,” said Cheney. “They threaten those who speak against them with death. We cannot entrust our country and our freedom to a petty, vindictive, cruel, unstable man who wants to be a tyrant.”
This is how dictators destroy free nations. They threaten those who speak against them with death. We cannot entrust our country and our freedom to a petty, vindictive, cruel, unstable man who wants to be a tyrant. #Womenwillnotbesilenced#VoteKamalahttps://t.co/URH5s929Sa
The next day, Mayes announced her investigation into Trump over his remarks. Mayes claimed at the time that Trump’s speech may have been a death threat.
“I have already asked my criminal division chief to start looking at that statement, analyzing it for whether it qualifies as a death threat under Arizona’s laws,” said Mayes. “I’m not prepared now to say whether it was or it wasn’t, but it is not helpful as we prepare for our election and as we try to make sure that we keep the peace at our polling places and in our state.”
Mayes made the announcement of her investigation just days before Election Day.
Although Mayes dropped her investigation into Trump’s remarks, she said her office wouldn’t be dropping its case against him and his 2020 electors, who face multiple felonies related to conspiracy and forgery. Trump is an unindicted co-conspirator in that case.
“We’re going to stay focused on the case we brought,” said Mayes. “Those are serious charges, they are state charges and they are not affected one bit by Donald Trump’s reelection to the presidency.”
Mayes also claimed in a recent press conference that Trump presents a threat to the state and federal constitutions, especially the Project 2025 plan drafted by the Heritage Foundation in 2023.
“I do not believe that in electing Donald Trump Arizona voters voted to shred the U.S. and Arizona constitutions,” said Mayes. “If Donald Trump tries to do that [Project 2025], he will have to go through me first.”
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes announced during Channel 12 News’ “Sunday Square-Off,” that her office is now investigating President Donald Trump’s comments about “radical war hawk,” former U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY). The comments took place during a Glendale appearance with Tucker Carlson.
Mayes reportedly asked investigators to determine if Trump’s rhetorical remark on Cheney’s attitude toward sending American servicemen to war qualifies as a death threat when he said, “Let’s see how she feels about it. You know, when the guns are trained on her face.”
Speaking with 12News, Mayes said, “I have already asked my criminal division chief to start looking at that statement, analyzing it for whether it qualifies as a death threat under Arizona’s laws,” according to AZCentral.
“I’m not prepared now to say whether it was or it wasn’t, but it is not helpful as we prepare for our election and as we try to make sure that we keep the peace at our polling places and in our state,” she said.
During the campaign event at Glendale Stadium, Trump was interviewed by Tucker Carlson, and the topic turned to former Vice President Dick Cheney and his daughter’s sudden turn against him during his presidency. Trump lamented that the elder Cheney turned against him but said he understood it as a need to support his daughter.
In full context President Trump told Carlson, “Dick Cheney’s daughter is a very dumb individual. She’s a radical war hawk. Let’s put her with a rifle standing there, with nine barrels shooting at her, okay? Let’s see how she feels about it, you know, when the guns are trained on her face. They’re all war hawks when they’re sitting in Washington in a nice building, saying, ‘Oh, gee, well, let’s send 10,000 troops right into the mouth of the enemy.’ But she’s a stupid person. And I used to have, I’d have meetings with a lot of people and she always wanted to go to war with people.”
🚨TRUMP: "Dick Cheney's daughter is a very dumb individual. She's a radical war hawk. Let's put her with a rifle standing there with 9 barrels shooting at her, let's see how she feels about it when the guns trained on her face. They're all war hawks when they're sitting in… pic.twitter.com/Wzq4BBiP8C
Per Reuters, Mayes added “That’s the question, whether it did cross the line. It’s deeply troubling. It is the kind of thing that riles people up, and that makes our situation in Arizona and other states more dangerous.”
In a post to X, Cheney alluded to Trump being a “dictator” and characterized his comment with the claim, “They threaten those who speak against them with death,” and went on to call Trump a “petty, vindictive, cruel, unstable man who wants to be a tyrant.”
Trump campaign National Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a Friday statement that his remarks were misinterpreted. She said, “President Trump is 100% correct that warmongers like Liz Cheney are very quick to start wars and send other Americans to fight them, rather than go into combat themselves.” She added that this “is just a desperate attempt to help out Kamala Harris’ failed campaign.”
Every media outlet is reporting on the new Liz Cheney hoax.
Trump did not call for her to be kiIIed. The media know this and are purposely misleading their readers and leaving out the context.
Responding to the controversy in a post to Truth Social Trump wrote, “All I’m saying about Liz Cheney is that she is a War Hawk, and a dumb one at that, but she wouldn’t have ‘the guts’ to fight herself. It’s easy for her to talk, sitting far from where the death scenes take place, but put a gun in her hand, and let her go fight, and she’ll say, ‘No thanks!’ Her father decimated the Middle East, and other places, and got rich by doing so. He’s caused plenty of DEATH, and probably never even gave it a thought. That’s not what we want running our Country!”
Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen reacted to the announcement Sunday in post to X writing, “Just learned that Kris Mayes is investigating @realDonaldTrump over what he said about Liz Cheney. First of all his comment was clearly not a threat. He said if she had to go to war instead of our kids then she would not be a warhawk. She has it completely backwards!
She should have told the media what he said was protected by the 1st amendment. Protect the Constitution instead of weaponizing your office to harrass and censure!”
She should have told the media what he said was protected by the 1st amendment. Protect the Constitution instead of weaponizing your office to harrass and censure!
Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-AZ-08) is questioning why the Capitol wasn’t secured during the Jan. 6, 2021 breach.
Lesko posed the question in response to an interview aired last month by former Fox News host Tucker Carlson on his newer, independent show platformed by X (formerly known as Twitter). Tucker interviewed the Capitol Police Chief at the time of the Jan. 6 breach of the Capitol, Steven Sund. Fox News never aired the original interview with Carlson, which occurred in April.
“Why wasn’t [the] Capitol secured on Jan. 6?” asked Lesko. “Tell all from Capitol Chief of Police…”
🚨MUST WATCH: Why wasn't Capitol secured on Jan. 6? Tell all from Capitol Chief of Police… https://t.co/wAU6lgcW6q
In an interview just shy of an hour long, Sund painted a picture of intentional neglect to properly secure the Capitol by federal intelligence, Congress, and military leadership.
U.S. Capitol Police has its own intelligence agency, Intelligence Agency Intelligence Coordination Division (IIACD), which coordinates with other intelligence agencies. Sund said that all intelligence he received indicated that the planned Jan. 6 protest would be “just like the other MAGA rallies” that occurred in November and December, with “limited skirmishes” involving Antifa and Black Lives Matter (BLM).
However, Sund said the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and the military had intelligence not received by Capitol Police, such as planned attacks on Congress and violence against police officers.
Federal reports assessing the government preparation and response to the Jan. 6 breach are linked below, and arranged in order from oldest to newest:
Sund said neither the FBI or DHS put out a single official document specific to Jan. 6, which he said was unusual. Sund reported that normally one or both agencies would issue briefings addressing anticipated dangers, such as a Joint Intelligence Bulletin (JIB). None were issued ahead of the incident, as noted by the Senate Rules Committee. It was only after the attack that the intelligence agencies issued a JIB about potential future attacks inspired by the Jan. 6 events.
The GAO put together a timeline of open source data that government agencies collected concerning planned attacks on the Capitol months prior to Jan. 6.
On Jan. 5, the day before the attack, Sund said he had a conference call with then-chief of police at the Metropolitan Police Department, Robert Contee; then-assistant director of the FBI Washington Field Office, Steve D’Antuono; then-commander of the Army Military District of Washington, Omar Jones; then-commanding general of the D.C. National Guard, William Walker. Sund said not one person on the call expressed concerns about any threats of violence at the Capitol. DHS was absent from the call.
A Senate committee report released in July revealed that intelligence agencies repeatedly ignored planned threats of violence concerning Jan. 6. Some of those threats were addressed in emails to D’Antuono leading up to the attack. Yet, Sund said D’Antuono said nothing about those warnings.
Sund said that he wasn’t the only police chief in the dark, citing Contee as another leader who didn’t receive notifications on potential dangers, like the Norfolk memo. That Situational Information Report (SIR) from the Norfolk division of the FBI warned of the potential for violence in connection to the planned Jan. 6 rally. Wray told the Senate Judiciary Committee that he never read the memo.
Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley and Acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller discussed locking down the city and revoking permits on Capitol Hill, according to Sund. Sund said he never received requests to revoke the permits, though that was under his purview.
“Instead, on Jan. 4, what does Miller do? He puts out a memo restricting the National Guard from carrying various weapons, any weapons, any civil disobedience equipment that would be utilized for the very demonstrations or violence that he sees coming. It just doesn’t make any sense,” said Sund. “When I was calling begging for assistance on Jan. 6, they weren’t allowed to respond at first.”
Sund said the CPB denied him federal resources twice due to “optics” and “because the intelligence didn’t support” his requests. The CPB included Paul Irving, House Sergeant of Arms, who responded directly to former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Mike Stenger, Senate Sergeant of Arms, who responded directly to Minority Senate Leader Mitch McConnell, at the time.
“Even when we’re under attack, I have to go to those same two people to request the National Guard to be brought in,” said Sund.
The third and final member of the CPB is the Architect of the Capitol. From 2020 until February, that was Brett Blanton. President Joe Biden fired Blanton in February over extensive allegations of misconduct detailed in an inspector general report last year. Blanton told investigators that wasn’t at the Capitol on Jan. 6 because he was working remotely that day; Blanton further stated that neither he nor his staff spoke with Capitol Police about a request for an emergency declaration or National Guard support in advance of the Capitol breach.
Sund recounted the key timeline of that fateful day.
According to Sund, there were at least 150-180 National Guard members in the Capitol at law enforcement’s disposal, many within eyesight of the Capitol. The Capitol was breached at 12:53; by 12:55, Sundcalled the Washington, D.C. police department and spoke with Jeff Carroll for help. At 12:58, he called Sergeant Arms asking for additional assistance from the military. Irving said he would “run it up the chain,” implying Pelosi. The law allows Irving to make the decision himself in an emergency situation, such as that which occurred Jan. 6.
Stenger also deferred to Irving when Sund called. Over the next 71 minutes, Sund reported calling 32 people for help, including 17 police agencies. 11 of those calls were follow-up calls to Irving. After all that time, Irving finally issued approval for federal assistance.
We know that the President of the United States incited this insurrection – this armed rebellion – against our American democracy. He must go. pic.twitter.com/pIxOv2hOQv
Irving testified to the Senate in 2021 that he disagreed with Sund’s recollection. Sund said that testimony almost didn’t happen. When the Senate initially issued its call for testimony, it reportedly asked for only current security employees — which would’ve excluded Irving, Stenger, and Sund. Those three men were at the top of the security apparatus on Jan. 6. It wasn’t until Sund contacted the rules committee to ask to testify that the three men were included.
To date, Irving has never explained why it took him 71 minutes to obtain permission to deploy federal assistance that day. He resigned promptly after Jan. 6, and he is retired according to his LinkedIn, where he was last active at least seven months ago. Stenger passed away last June.
Pelosi, the head of Irving’s chain of command, was exempted from congressional inquiries into Jan. 6; Rep. Bennie Thompson effectively said that there was no need to look into Pelosi.
“Bennie Thompson said there is only one request: Nancy Pelosi is off limits…Shouldn't the very first question be, why was the Capitol so ill-prepared that day?" – @GOPLeader on Pelosi's illegitimate partisan witch-hunt👇 pic.twitter.com/xTKBH9txw2
The day after the Jan. 6 incident, there appeared to be a lockstep effort to assign blame for the Capitol invasion on Sund.
Pelosi called for Sund’s resignation, and falsely claimed that Sund hadn’t contacted her since the Capitol invasion. Yet, Sund spoke with Pelosi on the evening of Jan. 6.
Then, the intelligence agencies told mainstream media outlets through anonymous sources that Capitol Police turned down federal resources in the days leading up to Jan. 6.
Sund resigned after the Jan. 6 incident; in January, Sund released a memoir, “Courage Under fire: Under Siege and Outnumbered 58 to 1 on January 6,” detailing the events of that day.
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
Despite dedicating nearly two decades of his life to the military, one Phoenix man learned Wednesday that he may not receive the military benefits he’s earned, due to the COVID-19 vaccine and a Fox News interview. The fate of the man, an Air Force Master Sergeant named Nick Kupper, and thousands of other military members rests in the court system through ongoing cases like Doster v. Kendall.
Of well over 2.1 million American troops (over 1.3 million active duty and over 795,000 reserves), over 113,700 troops (5 percent) aren’t vaccinated. Nearly 269,000 troops (over 12 percent) are partially vaccinated, and 1.7 million troops (82 percent) are fully vaccinated. Of those who are partially vaccinated, only about 20,000 were granted temporary or permanent exemptions. However, it appears that those were exemptions in name only due to multiple reports that the exemption recipients were already scheduled to end their service.
Kupper appeared on Fox News host Tucker Carlson’s show, “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” last Thursday. He shared that several legislators were intervening in cases like his, but not enough to stop a forced mass military exodus that he warned would be detrimental for national security.
“After 19 years they’re going to throw everything away that I’ve worked for,” said Kupper. “This is not a problem to be solved for tomorrow, or the next day — this is a problem right now. You’re talking about over 10 percent of your military is looking to be canned right now. I mean, if I were China or if I were Russia, I’d be chomping at the bit right now.”
Kupper shared on Wednesday that he received his separation package for not taking the COVID-19 vaccine as well as a Department of Defense (DOD) letter of reprimand for appearing on Fox News host Tucker Carlson’s show. Kupper disclosed that the DOD accused him of aiding our enemies through his interview.
I just received my separation package for not taking an EUA vaccine. I also received a surprise letter of reprimand for appearing on @TuckerCarlson’s show.
However, the DOD determinations in Kupper’s case may not be set in stone. On Thursday, Ohio Southern District Court Judge Matthew McFarland issued an injunction preventing the Air Force from punishing those who sought a religious exemption to the COVID-19 vaccine. That impacts around 10,000 service members nationwide.
McFarland was appointed in 2019 by former President Donald Trump under the bipartisan recommendation of Ohio Senators Rob Portman (R-OH) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH).
Judge McFarland, in the lawsuit Doster v. Kendall, just provided an injunction preventing the Air Force from punishing anyone who sought a religious exemption! The AF has 14 days to argue it, but if they are unsuccessful it will become a permanent injunction.#winning#THANKGOD
A class within Phoenix’s elite private Catholic high school, Brophy Preparatory School, lectured students that Fox News host Tucker Carlson was anti-Semitism, anti-Mexican, and anti-African American.
A photo obtained by AZ Free News featured a slide shown in a “History of the Catholic Church” class, equating Carlson with controversial 20th century Roman Catholic priest Charles Coughlin. Carlson is Episcopalian.
“Tucker Carlson = today’s fr. Charles Coughlin,” read the slide. “Key message: White American Christians should be very afraid[.] You’re being replaced! (Great Replacement Theory).”
Coughlin pioneered political radio, garnering around 30 million listeners in his program’s heyday. He denounced the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) though he expressed opposition to banks and Jewish people in power. He opposed communism but was equally against free market capitalism, going so far as to support Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s (FDR) New Deal initially. Coughlin advanced the term “social justice.”
For years, the mainstream media discussed how Democrats were relying on and influencing demographic changes to skew voting in their favor, quipping “demographics are destiny.” The 2020 election results cast doubts on Democrats’ long-term plan as more of a theory, when voter turnout reflected that Republicans were the party of multiracial, working-class voters in practice. However, polling suggested that younger Hispanic and black individuals were more likely to vote Democrat.
The slide then listed evidence to support its claims of Carlson’s racism toward Jewish, Mexican, and black people. It listed various claims put forth by Carlson. On charges of antisemitism, the slide summarized Carlson’s statements that George Soros, a Jewish man, and international forces secretly influence politics and finances.
On charges of anti-Mexican sentiment, the slide summarized Carlson’s statements that the government tolerates mass migration in order to reduce white Americans’ power. The slide also included an out-of-context reference to Carlson’s belief that mass unchecked immigration leads to poorer, dirtier living conditions.
Carlson’s full remarks focused on peoples’ concerns over the quality of areas where large numbers of immigrants settled and how elected leaders ignored those concerns. He also characterized immigrants as “nice people” and highlighted concerns from Tijuana, Mexico citizens over the spikes in crime and uncleanliness accompanying Honduran immigrants— something mainstream media and the classroom slideshow neglected to spotlight.
“[Immigrants are] nice people, no one doubts that, but as an economic matter this is insane. It’s indefensible, so no one even tries to defend it. Instead our leaders demand that you shut up and accept this. We have a moral obligation to admit the world’s poor, they tell us, even if it makes our country poorer and dirtier and more divided,” stated Carlson. “Immigration is a form of atonement. Previous leaders of our country committed sins; we must pay for those sins by welcoming an endless chain of migrant caravans. That’s the argument they make.”
Finally, on charges of anti-African American sentiments, the slide pointed out how Carlson called George Floyd protestors “criminal mobs,” and how he insisted on the necessity of seeing Supreme Court Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s LSAT scores. The slide neglected to include the fact that Carlson was referring to those engaged in rioting when accusing George Floyd protestors of criminal mob behavior.
“Reason and process and precedent mean nothing to them. They use violence to get what they want immediately,” wrote Carlson. “On television, hour by hour, we watch these people — criminal mobs — destroy what the rest of us have built.”
Concerning Jackson’s LSAT scores, Carlson shared doubts that Jackson had a record of legal mastery.
“[An LSAT score] would settle the question, conclusively, whether she’s a once-in-a-generation legal talent,” stated Carlson. “It would seem like Americans in a democracy have a right to know that and much more before giving her a lifetime appointment.”
Tucker: It might be time for Joe Biden to let us know Ketanji Brown Jackson’s LSAT score was. Why wouldn’t he tell us that… pic.twitter.com/boPHU5PnMd
