Lesko’s past includes criminal charge, bankruptcy
Rep. Debbie Lesko has often noted a troubled first marriage to an abusive husband as a sign of how far she has moved on in her life.
But Lesko’s past is more checkered than a bad marriage. Her life story includes bankruptcies, multiple aliases, an arrest warrant and multiple lawsuits for unpaid bills.
Today, the Peoria Republican finishing her first full term in Congress is one of President Donald Trump’s most loyal supporters in Washington and is known nationally as a staunch supporter of conservative ideals.
Earlier this year, Lesko helped lead Trump’s national public relations push back against impeachment charges during his trial in the Senate, appearing on national TV and at in-person events to defend his presidency.
Her past, however, is a dark chapter in the story of a woman who casts herself as a mother facing domestic abuse who climbed from school-board meetings to the state Legislature to the halls of Congress.
In written responses to questions from The Arizona Republic, Lesko, 61, detailed some aspects of her stormy marriage to Jeffrey Allen Ignas, whom she called “a con-man who preyed” on her and others.
She also created a website where she talks about “this horrific time in my life” and includes a testimonial from her daughter with Ignas.
“After years of constant abuse, threats of death, and under his all-encompassing control, I finally reached a point where I knew I had to try to leave,” Lesko said of her decision to file for divorce and seek protection from Ignas. “I thought I was going to get killed. I’m thankful every day I survived.”
Lesko is favored to win a second term representing the state’s 8th Congressional District, which spans much of the West Valley. She is running against Democrat Michael Muscato.
Mark Macias, a spokesman for Muscato, said Lesko has deflected her own responsibility for years of bad business practices. She got away with it because she used aliases, he said.
“She has run on a business record that was a lie,” Macias said. “She was sued for running a fraudulent business.”
He said the website she produced explaining her background only came about because of media inquiries about her past, not because of a desire for the truth to be known.
Misdemeanor charge, financial woes tied to former husband
In 1985, Lesko married Ignas, a onetime handyman convicted of theft on several occasions and who is currently serving a prison sentence for fraud under the name Jeffrey Allen Herald.
Court records suggest Lesko and Ignas were repeatedly buffeted by trouble during their marriage.
In April 1988, Lesko, then 29 and known as Debra Kay Lorenz, was charged in Conroe, Texas, a city north of Houston, with tampering with government records, a misdemeanor. She was arraigned on that matter three months later.
“Thirty-five years ago, I married an abusive, con-artist ex-husband who ran scams on everyone, including me,” Lesko said. “I made some mistakes, but the misdemeanor from 32 years ago was dismissed.”
Nothing else appears in the court’s online records until 1994, when the prosecutor’s office dropped the case, along with other cases mostly involving bad checks.
He said at the time that it was “in the best interest of justice due to the age of these cases, unavailability of witnesses, low probability of conviction, and nature of the offenses.”
Ignas’ troubles began earlier and never really stopped.
In June 1988, a Maricopa County Superior Court judge sentenced Ignas to 10 years in prison stemming from a 1985 fraud case.
He spent more than three years behind bars. In January 1992, Ignas was released to what was known as home arrest. Six months later, he was released from home arrest and transitioned to parole.
But Ignas and Lesko quickly faced more trouble.
In October 1992, the couple filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy protection. That case was closed in July 1993, but at that time their lives were still worsening.
In March 1993, Ignas and Lesko were sued for failing to pay for two stone mixers they had leased for their company AAA Fence Company. The lawsuit claimed they owed more than $10,000 on the equipment.
A month later, a lending company sued the couple for an unpaid bill totaling nearly $11,000.
In May 1993, the couple filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection.
“My ex-husband was a con-man who preyed on myself, and countless other innocent people, which resulted in personal financial ruin,” Lesko said. “As a result, I was forced to file for bankruptcy protection.”
The case files show Lesko was known as Debbie Harris, Debra Ignas, Debra Schultz and Debra Howard.
Ignas had several aliases as well. He was known as Jeffrey Stallcup, Jeffrey Harris and James Schultz.
Lesko said the fake names also were tied to her husband.
“As he was a con-man who used multiple aliases and was ultimately sent to prison, I had to list all the alias names he had used for me in order to protect myself in the bankruptcy proceedings,” she said.
In July 1993, Ignas and a business partner, John Cannon, were fighting over the contracting businesses they had combined just months earlier. Cannon absorbed Ignas’ Cardinal Fence Company and was responsible for being properly licensed and bonded, according to court records.
But he wasn’t.
Ignas and Cannon bickered over money, and their combined business, Advance Masonry, stalled.
Though Cannon ran the business, in August 1993 Ignas was sent back to prison for violating the terms of his parole by contracting without a license.
“Mr. Ignas was in the process of locating another licensed residential contractor to complete any contracts when he was arrested,” a lawyer for his business wrote in the case.
Court records show Cannon was not properly licensed and bonded, but Ignas spent at least 10 months in prison for parole violation while that matter made its way through court.
Ignas’ efforts to have the matter tossed out were repeatedly denied.
Meanwhile, Advance Masonry faced another problem during the time he and Cannon were fighting over the company: Another Advance employee got in a car accident that led to a lawsuit against Ignas and the company two months later.
By then, Lesko had had enough. In September 1993, she filed for divorce from Ignas.
“The abuse began early on in our relationship,” she said. “I remember a specific incident, late in my pregnancy with my daughter, when he punched the hell out of me in the stomach. It was so horrible; I could have lost my baby. The abuse continued from there.”
Their second bankruptcy case closed in April 1994, and the swirl of court actions appears to have dissipated.
Lesko went back to court in 2006 to get Ignas to pay child support he had failed to provide. Meanwhile, she was rebuilding her life.
“I thank God every day that I got out of that marriage alive because so many
women don’t,” Lesko said. “Since my survival, I have fought every day to protect women. I now serve as the Co-Chair of the Congressional Bipartisan Working Group to End Domestic Violence and always look for opportunities to advocate for domestic violence victims.”
From school politics to Legislature to Congress
She began an improbable political career climb that led to Congress.
Lesko immersed herself in the Peoria Unified School District’s community committee, where she opposed higher taxes and cited administrative waste in the system.
In 2006, she ran for the school board in Peoria, and, with the endorsement of U.S. Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., finished fourth in a five-person field. She remained active in school board meetings and contributed to The Arizona Republic as a community columnist, where she wrote about, among other matters, dangers posed by illegal immigration, the war on Christmas and the prevalence of domestic violence.
In 2008, she topped a four-person field to win a seat in the Arizona House of Representatives. In 2014, she was elected to the Arizona Senate, where she gained national attention for her work to advance school-choice legislation as part of the American Legislative Exchange Council, an organization bestknown for producing ready-to-introduce “model” legislation crafted with input from corporate America.
In April 2018, Lesko won the special election to fill the seat vacated by Franks, whose own personal problems imploded his congressional career. Franks was accused of sexual misconduct by several of his staffers who claimed, among other things, that he pressured them to have his child.
Lesko defeated a packed Republican field of candidates, then dispatched Democrat Hiral Tipirneni.
“It’s very surreal,” Lesko said on the night she won a seat in Congress. “Twenty-five years ago, I left an abusive husband. And I sure as heck never would have dreamt in a million years that I would be running for Congress, be a congresswoman.”