Ex-governor praises new Trump lawyer’s tenacity
An attorney with experience ... What’s President Donald Trump in for with his latest addition to his legal team?
According to one former client, the president has a bulldog in attorney John Dowd.
“He’s a tough guy; he’s not scared of anyone,” former Gov. Fife Symington said of John Dowd.
He should know: Dowd started representing Symington during the governor’s first term as federal investigators were looking into his involvement in a failed savings and loan. Dowd later led the defense when Symington went on trial for bank fraud, extortion and filing false financial reports.
Symington, speaking from his parttime home in California, said he was surprised to hear of Dowd’s new client, since he thought the long-time attorney had retired. But Dowd was a logical pick, he said.
“It doesn’t surprise me they brought in someone with the depth of experience of operating both in and outside of the the Department of Justice,” Symington said.
After working as a federal prosecutor, Dowd led Major League Baseball’s investigation into Pete Rose, which resulted in the all-time hit leader being banned from the sport for life for gambling.
In private practice, Dowd represented then-U.S. Rep. John McCain in the Keating Five days, which eventually led him to Symington.
Dowd has apparently not lost any of bombast he exhibited during his Symington days. He sent a lacerating email to a Wall Street Journal reporter after the reporter’s story portrayed the defense in an insider-trading trial as being caught off guard. Dowd was part of the defense team for hedge-fund operator Raj Rajaratnam, who was later convicted.
So, by the way, was Symington. He was later pardoned by President Bill Clinton on Clinton’s last day in office.
» For once, a positive ranking ... Arizona is (nearly) the best in the nation for at least one thing — putting women in charge.
Representation 20/20, a Marylandbased organization that works to get more women elected to office regardless of political party, this week released its 2017 Gender Parity Index. Arizona won the bronze medal. The index ranked the Grand Canyon State third in the nation behind New Hampshire and Washington for gender parity. We moved up a ranking after more than a decade in fourth place behind California.
States are evaluated based on the number of women in the U.S. Congress, statewide office, the state legislature and mayoral positions.
Arizona got major kudos for having had more female governors than any other state in the country: Rose Mofford, Jane Hull, Janet Napolitano and Jan Brewer.
It also won top marks for having the highest share of females in a legislative chamber, with 46.7 percent in the state Senate.
Don’t get too excited, though. The 50state contest was graded on a curve, and Arizona still got a C.
But then again, think how much better that is than Arizona’s ranking on all those measures of public education.
» From private beers to a public hearing ... We don’t call him “Shooter” for nothing: Rep. Don Shooter, R-Yuma, shot off his mouth at a public hearing, revealing news that the director of the Department of Child Safety would have preferred to keep private.
“As a side note, Director ( Greg) McKay was being heavily recruited by other political subdivisions, and he has decided to stay,” Shooter said at a hearing this week where the agency reported strides in reducing its backlog and caseloads to the Joint Legislative Budget Committee. “Which I’m very grateful for and hopefully other people are as well.”
McKay was not present for the unexpected accolade but, through an agency spokeswoman, declined to elaborate on the job offers.
But Shooter had already let the cat out of the bag. Asked for details after the hearing, he demurred. Sort of.
“He’s had a number of people asking him (about new employment offers) because he’s doing a kick-a-- job,” Shooter said of McKay. But Shooter wouldn’t share details, saying it had come up in a conversation over beers and he didn’t realize that it was intended to be private.
Shooter, like other members on the budget panel, praised the reported progress by DCS. It came after the agency, and McKay, drew sharp criticism from some of the very same lawmakers who were now applauding his agency’s work.
» Quote of the week “I was overzealous in my defense of the Universities and while I have publicly apologized to Mr. Finchem, I do not wish to be a distraction to the ongoing work of the Regents and the Universities.” — Greg Patterson, former chairman of the Arizona Board of Regents, in his resignation letter after a secret recording of his critique of Rep. Mark Finchem’s dress and political future was published by The Republic.