Former Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey has been contacted by a special counsel investigating an attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election, an aide to the former governor confirmed Tuesday.
Ducey was one of many targets of Donald Trump’s attempt to stay in power after being defeated by Democratic President Joe Biden three years ago, some of them in Arizona. Trump lost to Biden in Arizona by 10,457 votes, marking the first time in decades that Democrats had taken over the state.
Ducey’s former chief of staff, Daniel Scarpinato, confirmed that Ducey was contacted as part of an ongoing investigation by Special Counsel Jack Smith, but declined to provide details of the conversation.
“He is responsive and will do the right thing, as he has done since the election,” Scarpinato said. CNN was the first to report the outreach to the former Republican governor.
Ducey is widely known for standing up to Trump’s pressure campaign, famously silencing a phone call from him while approving the 2020 election results.
But before the election, Mr. Ducey had a tenuous but supportive relationship with the president. He promoted the state’s mail-in voting system at Trump’s White House meetings, appeared at Trump rallies, and aides advised Trump’s team on winning in Arizona.
However, the two soon exemplified the division within Republican politics. Ducey, who has been accused of being Trump’s punching bag for refusing to change the outcome in Arizona, last year spearheaded efforts to elect traditional Republicans to governorships across the country.
When the Arizona governor’s candidate lost the primary, Ducey channeled more than $14 million into campaign support for Trump-backed Republican candidate Kari Lake, in keeping with her goal of electing a Republican. Lake has featured false allegations of election fraud at the center of his campaign, which may be one reason why Republican voters defected to give Democratic Governor Katie Hobbs the victory.
After stepping down in January after eight years at the helm of the state, Ducey announced he would lead an effort to build support for the conservative views of free enterprise. Meanwhile, Mr. Trump, who still holds a grip on grassroots voters, is the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican nomination.
Earlier this month, The Washington Post reported that Ducey told donors about the ongoing investigation into President Trump’s efforts to change the election ahead of the Capitol riots on January 6, 2021. As part of that, he said he was surprised Smith’s team hadn’t reached out to him. President Trump announced Tuesday on his own social media platforms that he had received a second targeted letter in the investigation, suggesting criminal charges could be filed soon.
Who else has the special counsel contacted in Arizona?
Smith’s office continues to focus on Arizona, where Trump tried to influence several lawmakers to change the outcome of the election, and where his false allegations appear to be rooted. . The survey highlights Arizona’s prominence as a battleground state that Biden won by a narrow margin on the map in 2020.
Smith’s team met with several Republican lawmakers in the spring and obtained records from the Arizona Secretary of State’s office related to two election cases, including possible and proposed evidence and communications with opposing attorneys. ) was summoned. The current and former Speaker of the Arizona House of Representatives, Glendale Republican Ben Thoma and Mesa Republican Rusty Bowers, spoke to investigators and the FBI as part of the investigation.
Senate President Warren Petersen, Republican Gilbert, and two other senators were subpoenaed in February. In 2021, the Senate ordered a review of Maricopa County ballots in the presidential and U.S. Senate elections, but the move is widely discredited and has led to enduring distrust of Grand Canyon state elections.
Two of the key players in the investigation, then-Senate Speaker Karen Huang (Republican Prescott, Kelly Townsend, Republican Apache Junction), were investigating the FBI’s involvement in Trump’s efforts to invalidate the election results. previously said it had submitted communications and records of
Please contact reporter Stacy Berchanger. stacey.barchenger@arizonarepublic.com or 480-416-5669.
