Who will pay for claims that our leaders were bribed?

Last week, Arizona and America learned, via a long-hidden report, that investigators for the state Attorney General’s Office found no fraud was afoot in the 2020 election.

So naturally on Thursday, the election conspiracy crowd at the state Capitol cracked open yet another crackpot theory:

That the Sinaloa drug cartel bribed Gov. Katie Hobbs, two members of Arizona’s congressional delegation, three of the five Maricopa County supervisors, House Speaker Ben Toma and a who’s who of elected and appointed officials and judges in order to rig our elections.

Laundered money, racketeering, three unmarked rental vans loaded with $6 million and more than 100,000 filled-in ballots.

The accuser, a Scottsdale insurance agent by the name of Jacqueline Breger, had it all. All, that is, but actual evidence to back up her claims.

Yet she was invited by a member of the Arizona Legislature to lay out the supposed conspiracy during an allday livestreamed legislative hearing on elections — a hearing that just happened to come a day after we learned the yearlong AG investigation found no evidence of wrongdoing in 2020.

As diversions go, it was a breathtaking one. And, potentially, an expensive one, I imagine, once the defamation lawsuits get started.

Certainly, it recharged the hearts of election deniers from coast to coast, starting right there in the room with Senate Elections Committee Chairwoman Wendy Rogers.

“Thank you, Ms. Breger,” Rogers said, as Breger concluded her testimony. “You’re a brave woman.”

Breger was given nearly 45 minutes to level her accusations and name names, helpfully livestreamed by the state of Arizona and broadcast on a variety of far-right websites. She was invited to give her presentation by Republican Rep. Liz Harris of Mesa, one of the Legislature’s biggest election deniers.

You may recall that Harris was the lone Republican holdout to pass the Republicans’ budget a few weeks ago. A few days later, she quietly changed her vote to yes, allowing Republicans to pass their budget on a party-line vote and send it to Hobbs for the inevitable veto.

It appears Thursday’s hearing was the price of Harris’ yes vote.

Legislative leaders allowed her to use state resources to accuse dozens of public officials and private citizens of jumping into the pocket of the Sinaloa drug cartel.

And, oh boy, was that a crowdpleaser. By Sunday, “Arrest Katie Hobbs” was trending on Twitter.

It’s a given that heads should roll

here.

By Sunday evening, Rogers was backpedaling, either to try to save her own sorry hide or to limit the Legislature’s liability.

“Any claims as serious as those presented to us should have been immediately turned in to Arizona law enforcement officials and not brought before the Legislature,” she said, in a press release issued on Sunday by the state Senate. “This was not the proper venue to discuss what could potentially be criminal activity.”

You’ll notice she didn’t deny that the bribery took place. Or question Breger’s research, which apparently began with a story laid out in her boyfriend John Thaler’s nasty divorce complaint — claims that one judge called “a delusional and fantastical narrative.”

Rogers needs to be removed as chair of Senate elections committee. And if Senate President Warren Petersen doesn’t, there should be a new vote for his job. In fact, the elections committees in both the House and Senate need to be disbanded and rebuilt with the few remaining serious Republican legislators, people who haven’t taken a swan dive down the rabbit hole. (Democrats on the panels wisely boycotted Thursday’s meeting, opting not to witness the debacle.)

Petersen on Monday leaped to Rogers’ defense, saying no one in the Senate knew what Breger was going to say and the Senate would not have allowed it. He blamed Harris for the debacle.

“My senators have not engaged in such questionable behavior, nor do I believe they will in the future,” he said in a written statement. “I imagine the House is discussing how to address this situation with Rep. Harris.”

Meanwhile, House Speaker Ben Toma – one of those accused of working with the cartels – called out Harris in a statement.

“What should have been a joint hearing to examine common sense, election reforms evolved into disgraceful fringe theater. I’m not alone in believing that it was irresponsible and bad judgment, for Ms. Harris to invite a person to present unsubstantiated and defamatory allegations in a legislative forum.”

Harris should be censured and removed from her committee assignments for engineering this state-approved slime job. Along with Breger’s public comments came her written report, which accused not just public and private officials of money laundering but the entire Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Of course, Harris won’t be touched and the House and Senate elections committees will continue passing bills that have no hope of becoming law.

Republicans hold just a one-vote majority in both the House and the Senate. Simply put, Petersen and Toma cannot afford to alienate a single Republican legislator.

Thus comes this state-sponsored smear job and, no doubt, the resulting donations to MAGA “war chests” in the name of restoring “election integrity.”

New grist for the grift.