Government officials throughout our country are in deep need of some education on the First Amendment. And the latest ones are currently serving in the Town of Gilbert right here in Arizona.
Last week, AZ Free News released an investigative report on Gilbert’s Office of Digital Government (ODG) and its Orwellian monitoring of employees’ online speech. For over a decade, the ODG, which is made up of approximately a dozen employees, has been working to ensure that Gilbert’s 30 official digital accounts—along with the personal online posts of all Town of Gilbert employees—align with a progressive, liberal agenda. And how much do you think this is costing taxpayers in Gilbert? Over $1.1 million each year in salary alone, with Chief Digital Officer Dana Berchman making over $200,000 annually.
When asked about the allegations in the investigative report, the town responded that it “will not tolerate divisive, offensive or culturally insensitive posts from employees purporting to represent the Town.” That’s interesting. Who decides what’s divisive, offensive, or culturally insensitive? The employees within the ODG? Dana Berchman herself?
It’s hard to think of an issue more divisive than our last presidential election, and yet Berchman, who interned for Hillary Clinton’s 2000 Senate campaign, regularly used her personal social media profiles to promote then-presidential candidate Joe Biden while urging people to vote out then-President Donald Trump. You can go see for yourself on Dana Berchman’s X (formerly Twitter) profile. Oh no. Wait a minute. Within hours of the AZ Free News report breaking, Berchman and Gilbert Town Manager Patrick Banger made their profiles private. What does that tell you?
The reality is that what is happening in Gilbert demonstrates a clear pattern—from the federal government to local governments to our schools—to control, censor, and manipulate speech. And it’s all geared toward targeting conservative thought and traditional American ideals.
We saw it back in July 2021 when then-White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said, “We’re flagging problematic posts for Facebook that spread disinformation.” Read that again. She said that the federal government was flagging “problematics posts” FOR Facebook. But Psaki didn’t stop there. The next day, she turned around and said that if you’re banned from one social media platform, you should be banned from them all.
Then there’s what happened to Ann Atkinson who served as the executive director of the T.W. Lewis Center for Personal Development at Arizona State University’s (ASU) Barrett Honors College. Last February, Atkinson organized an event on “Health, Wealth, and Happiness” as part of a series from the Lewis Center focused on connecting students with professionals who can offer career and life advice. Speakers for the event included conservatives like Dennis Prager and Charlie Kirk, but the mere mention of these names caused many of the Barrett Honors College faculty to have a meltdown. Despite fierce opposition from these faculty members, the event did take place and was a great success.
So, how did ASU respond?
The university fired Lin Blake, the event operations manager at ASU Gammage and dismantled the Lewis Center in June, which terminated Atkinson’s position.
Stories like these—involving censorship of conservatives—can be found all across the nation, and now it appears Gilbert is no longer immune. The town’s residents should continue to push back against the ODG until the Gilbert Town Council takes action. And every American should stand behind them. Freedom of speech is foundational to our nation, and any attempts to control it are incredibly dangerous. After all, if the government can get away with this, what could that look like if your preferred political party isn’t in power?
Help Protect Freedom in Arizona by Joining Our Grassroots Network
Arizona needs to have a unified voice promoting economic freedom and prosperity, and the Free Enterprise Club is committed to making that happen. But we can’t do it alone. We need YOU!
Join our FREE Grassroots Action List to stay up to date on the latest battles against big government and how YOU can help influence crucial bills at the Arizona State Legislature.
If any business owner saw 450% growth in one of the company’s products or programs during a 15-month period, they would be ecstatic. And it’s safe to say that whatever that program was doing must be working. But for Governor Katie Hobbs and her allies in the teachers’ unions, who have never been known for their math skills, it’s a completely different story when it comes to the ESA program.
Back in July 2022, when then-Governor Doug Ducey signed universal school choice expansion into Arizona law, 13,400 students were enrolled in the ESA program. That number has now grown—as of January 16, 2024—to an astounding 73,415 students—a near 450% growth. Clearly, the program is in high demand, and it is definitely working. But after signing the Republican budget bill last year, without any cap or restrictions on ESAs, Hobbs is now trying to push a barrage of regulations that would effectively dismantle the popular program.
Earlier this month, our current governor announced her plan for the ESA program. And despite the fact that Hobbs is a product of private schools herself, her proposed changes will turn private schools into de-facto public schools and cause children to lose their scholarships, forcing them out of their current school.
Among the regulations promoted by Hobbs and the teachers’ unions is a requirement to attend public school for at least 100 days in order to qualify for the ESA program. So, let’s get this straight. Parents who already know that they do not want to send their children to public school—or that the public school won’t be able to meet their child’s needs—will have to send their kids to a public school for an arbitrary number of days in order to participate in the ESA program. That’s interesting, given the fact that there is no such requirement for families who want to switch school districts or move to a public charter school. Why should students who want to attend private school, just like our governor did, be treated any differently? Maybe it’s because Hobbs and the teachers’ unions are desperate to do anything they can to boost the declining enrollment in our state’s public schools?
Another of Hobbs’ proposals requires manual reviews of purchases over $500. This likely came from a false expenditure claim by Save Our Schools Arizona, who lied in a viral post on X that the Arizona Department of Education approved a reimbursement for a $500 Lego set. The fact is that under the current Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne, every single ESA purchase is already reviewed. If Hobbs wants to look at anyone for frivolous spending, perhaps she should start with her friend and former Democrat Superintendent of Public Instruction Kathy Hoffman whose tenure was ripe with approving odd expenses.
But perhaps the most absurd change Hobbs and the teachers’ unions want to make is to prohibit so-called “price gouging” by implementing price controls on private schools. This is absolutely hilarious considering the fact that for decades, teachers’ unions have pushed for billions more to be poured into public schools, which they got, and Arizona taxpayers are now giving district schools more money than ever before, at nearly $15,000 per student—more than double the cost of ESAs. Not once did Hobbs or any teachers’ union raise the concerns of price inflation associated with dumping more money into the system even though Arizona always seems to be another billion dollars away from “fully funding” education. And yet now that Arizona has universal ESAs, they decide we need price controls, but only for private schools. It’s hard to tell which is worse, their greed or their hypocrisy.
The reality is that ESAs strengthen ALL schools because competition delivers the best product—leading to better students, families, and communities. That’s why the program has become so popular—and why Hobbs knows she has to hide behind a flood of regulations rather than pushing for a repeal or cap on it. Now, it’s up to Arizona lawmakers to make sure her plan for ESAs is dead on arrival.
Please SUPPORT and DEFEND School Choice in Arizona
Arizona is the battleground for school choice in our country, and Katie Hobbs—together with the teachers’ unions—would like nothing more than to undo all the progress that has been made.
Will you reach out to your legislator and let them know you support ESAs and school choice, and consider it a top voting issue?
After several years of inflated budgets propped up by trillions in unsustainable COVID cash flowing to the states from the federal government, Arizona lawmakers will be coming into the new year and the new legislative session facing a potential shortfall for the budget year in excess of $400 million. Naturally, the left and their sycophants in the media have for months been decrying this to be the result of 1) historic tax cuts enacted by Republicans in 2021 and 2) the successful universal expansion of school choice in 2022. This couldn’t be further from the truth, and there are three key facts that need to be remembered when discussing the state budget and a potential funding gap.
1. The Shortfall Is a Fraction of the Arizona Budget, Nothing Like California’s Crisis
The projected $400 million shortfall represents less than 5% of the total state budget, which spends $17.8 billion this year. Far from catastrophic. Compare this to our neighbor California, facing a $68 billion dollar deficit (nearly four times the size of our entire budget), which represents 22% of their $308 billion bloated budget – up from less than $200 billion only four years ago.
Opposite to our approach, California has continuously increased taxes, having one of the highest income tax burdens in the country. They also don’t provide choice to parents and families to make educational decisions themselves. Surely, if Arizona taking less of the people’s hard-earned money and providing ESAs to all families is the cause of our small funding gap, California, doing the exact opposite, should place them in tip top shape, right?
2. State Revenues Continue to Rise, but Spending Does Too
Contrary to the wishes of the tax happy left, this small budget shortfall is not due to the historic tax cuts passed in 2021 that benefit every Arizonan either. The state is collecting more from taxpayers than it did in 2019, yet the income tax rate has effectively been cut in half. Part of that is due to the taxation of online sales. Initially sold to be an $85 million hit on taxpayers, it continues to bring in hundreds of millions more. The other more inconvenient reason for the left is the thousands fleeing high tax states like California to relocate themselves, their families, and their businesses here.
Source: JLBC FY2020 Appropriations Report & JLBC October Budget Forecast
This “lack of money in the state coffers” argument is laughable with one quick look at the Ongoing Revenue chart. In summary, lawmakers enacted a budget in 2019 that expected just shy of $11 billion in ongoing revenue. In their best assessment, they expected that to grow to nearly $12 billion by FY22 (blue). But what we have experienced since then (orange) is exponential revenue growth – growth that is still continuing today. In fact, the most recent estimate from the nonpartisan Joint Legislative Budget Committee (JLBC) staff is still close to $18 billion in state revenue by 2026. We do not have a revenue problem, and we never did. Rather, we have had a spending problem for years.
3. School Choice Not to Blame, and Government Schools Are at Record Levels of Funding
Unsurprisingly, the teachers’ unions, Democrats, and media continue their scare tactics, arguing that the massive increase in families taking advantage of their right to send their kids to the schools of their choice, is bankrupting the state and government schools. It’s no surprise that neither are true.
As the Goldwater Institute has made clear, increased use of ESAs does not take from district schools. In fact, district schools are receiving $14,673 per student, an amount never reached before, which has required the legislature to override the constitutional spending limit not once, not twice, but three times, allowing schools to spend billions in excess of the cap.
That ESAs are to blame for the shortfall is also easily debunked by simply looking at JLBC’s presentation to the Finance Advisory Committee in October. In the budget approved by the legislature and the Governor, ESA expenditures were projected to be $625 million. The actual amount is $665 million, not very far off at all. In other words, the projections made by lawmakers in July were accurate and fully budgeted for.
Budgeting Guidelines to Avoid Fiscal Failures
The big picture is that states across the country are seeing slowdowns in revenue growth and potential shortfalls, especially in personal income tax collections. That includes states that have reduced rates (like us), and those that have hiked theirs (like California). But unlike many of those high tax states, Arizona is in a good position.
As long as the legislature: 1) doesn’t allow Hobbs to use any budget gimmicks like rollovers, 2) doesn’t touch the rainy-day fund, and 3) uses this as an opportunity to right size government spending, we will be just fine.
Help Protect Freedom in Arizona by Joining Our Grassroots Network
Arizona needs to have a unified voice promoting economic freedom and prosperity, and the Free Enterprise Club is committed to making that happen. But we can’t do it alone. We need YOU!
Join our FREE Grassroots Action List to stay up to date on the latest battles against big government and how YOU can help influence crucial bills at the Arizona State Legislature.
Ozone levels in Maricopa County are lower today than they were 20 years ago. And the reality is that most of the ozone currently in the region is either due to natural events or coming from China. But you won’t hear facts like that from the Left. Instead, they’d rather hatch a scheme to enforce their climate change agenda on the American people, and one of their biggest targets in the past year has been Arizona. Now, after failing to convince our state to ban gas cars and gas stoves, the Sierra Club is attempting to use the courts to force this agenda upon us.
An Impossible Standard
Much of this began in September 2022 when the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) reclassified Maricopa County as a moderate nonattainment area of ozone limits under the Clean Air Act. This basically means that, according to the EPA, Maricopa County’s ozone levels are too high and therefore our state—including its citizens, motorists, and businesses—must be forced to adopt ozone control measures. Failure to comply with these measures could mean fines, penalties, or the withholding of federal transportation dollars for Arizona.
Of course, what they won’t tell you is that the main reason our ozone levels are too high isn’t because there are more cars on the road or Arizonans like trying new recipes on their gas stoves. The main reason our ozone levels are too high is because the federal government moved the goal posts back in 2015 when the EPA dropped its acceptable ozone levels from 75ppb to 70ppb.
To the average person, that may not seem like a big deal, but it is. In fact, in order to achieve the EPA’s standard by the August 3, 2024 deadline, Arizona would need to cut emissions by 50 percent. This is not only impossible, it’s absurd. It took our state over 23 years to reduce ozone pollution by 12.5 percent. There’s absolutely no way we could cut it by 50 percent in a year! But since the Maricopa Association of Governments (MAG) has become another puppet for the Left’s climate agenda, its plan fell right in line with its EPA masters.
Stopping MAG’s Green New Deal Plan
Along with a host of regulations on various business activities, MAG’s Green New Deal Implementation plan was filled with restrictions that would make AOC blush. It included:
Eliminating gas-powered cars.
Eliminating gas appliances.
Limits on things like lawn equipment, motorized boating, and water heaters.
Regulations on the commercial trucking industry that we rely on for supplies and goods.
Arizona could implement every one of these destructive measures, and we still wouldn’t come close to achieving the EPA’s ozone standard—especially by that deadline. In the meantime, our state would have been forced to suffer billions of dollars in economic damage all while watching our quality of life go down the tubes.
That’s why the Free Enterprise Club spent several months fighting back against MAG’s plan. And that proved to be a success. In June of this year, MAG abandoned its plan and instead sent a letter to the EPA that essentially adopted our position. It mentioned the challenges related to timing, the overwhelming contribution of ozone from outside sources, and the economic consequences we would face with such harsh ozone regulations. These are reasonable arguments that should be enough for the EPA to reconsider its standards, but the response from the Left was…a lawsuit.
The Sierra Club Sues to Force Arizona to Achieve the Impossible
In October, the liberal non-profit Sierra Club decided to sue the Biden administration to increase regulatory oversight of several states, including Arizona. And their goal is clear. They either want to get a liberal judge to force our state to implement California-style control measures, or they want to collude with the EPA to do a “sue and settle” and enter into a consent decree that does the same.
But what the Sierra Club intentionally ignores is that you could take all 4 million cars off the road in Maricopa County, and Arizona still couldn’t achieve the EPA’s impossible standards. Just look at what happened in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. Ozone levels increased from 79ppb to 87ppb even though we saw a dramatic decrease in cars on our roads.
You would think that would be enough to recognize that these measures won’t work. Or maybe, just maybe…the Sierra Club’s agenda isn’t really about ozone in the first place. That’s why the Club plans to fight back against this lawsuit and any other way that the Sierra Club is trying to force the Green New Deal on our state. The measures they are pushing are coercive, punitive, and likely illegal. And the people of Arizona shouldn’t have to sacrifice their freedoms so the Left can turn us into another California.
Help Protect Freedom in Arizona by Joining Our Grassroots Network
Arizona needs to have a unified voice promoting economic freedom and prosperity, and the Free Enterprise Club is committed to making that happen. But we can’t do it alone. We need YOU!
Join our FREE Grassroots Action List to stay up to date on the latest battles against big government and how YOU can help influence crucial bills at the Arizona State Legislature.
It’s time for COVID mandates to go away forever. And last month, one Arizona town took a step in this direction when it passed a resolution that needs to be a trend in every city throughout our state.
With a desire to take proactive measures to protect citizens’ constitutional rights, the Queen Creek Town Council passed Resolution No. 1540-23 with a unanimous vote during its regular meeting in September. And it’s quite clear. While the town recommends that people exercise personal responsibility to prevent illness, it committed to not implementing mandates concerning masks, vaccines, business closures, curfews, or “any similar measure.”
On top of that, the new town policy protects its employees who will be allowed to make their own decisions on vaccines and mask-wearing without facing the threat of losing their jobs for refusing to wear a mask or get the COVID vaccine. And perhaps even better, the new ordinance doesn’t just apply to COVID. It has been officially adopted by the town for the response to any future pandemic. It’s about time we see some sanity in government.
While it’s certainly sad that it ever had to come to this, COVID paranoia has been with us for several years now, and it’s clear that it’s not going away any time soon. Back in August, Morris Brown College in Atlanta implemented a two-week mask mandate for all students faculty and staff. And in the same month, Hollywood studio Lionsgate also instituted a mask mandate for employees due to COVID. Yes. This is still happening in August 2023.
But it also serves as a great reminder of all the ways government officials seized our freedoms during the pandemic.
We faced mask mandates, lockdowns, and social distancing all in the name of taking “15 days to slow the spread.” Many students were shut out of their classrooms for over a year only to find out that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) was following the advice of a teachers’ union. Some government officials threatened the idea of vaccine passports as the price of getting back to normal. Then, President Biden took it a step further when he went ahead and mandated vaccines for any employer with 100 or more employees with cities like Phoenix following in his footsteps. While the Supreme Court eventually blocked the move, many citizens had already given in to the mandate out of fear of losing their jobs, and the damage had been done.
But let’s take a step back to June 2020. If you’ll recall at that time, just about every local government in the state of Arizona enforced mask mandates. That included Phoenix, Tucson, Flagstaff, Mesa, Gilbert, Chandler, Scottsdale, Tempe, and more. But one town refused to implement mask mandates any longer. And that was Queen Creek.
Now, the town is leading the charge toward freedom again, and it’s time for the rest of Arizona’s cities to get on board. COVID hysteria has gone on long enough. And the Club is committed to doing whatever it takes to ensure that a great ordinance like the one Queen Creek just passed is spread around the entire state.
Help Protect Freedom in Arizona by Joining Our Grassroots Network
Arizona needs to have a unified voice promoting economic freedom and prosperity, and the Free Enterprise Club is committed to making that happen. But we can’t do it alone. We need YOU!
Join our FREE Grassroots Action List to stay up to date on the latest battles against big government and how YOU can help influence crucial bills at the Arizona State Legislature.
For local governments—and councils of governments—in Arizona, it appears that creating a climate action plan has become all the rage. Maybe that’s because it pays well.
The latest group to bow down at the altar of the Biden administration’s climate change agenda is the Maricopa Association of Governments (MAG). Back in August, MAG received a $1 million grant from the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Climate Pollution Reduction Grant Program to serve as the lead planning organization for the Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler metro area. The grant requires MAG to develop a priority climate action plan by next March, a comprehensive climate action plan by 2025, and a status report in 2027 after the four-year grant period expires.
But this $1 million grant isn’t the only way MAG stands to benefit.
The development of a priority climate action plan is simply a prerequisite for phase two of the EPA’s grant program, which concerns implementation grants for greenhouse gas emissions reduction policies, programs, and projects. And that could lead to MAG overseeing up to $4.6 billion in federal funding. Now, we see the true motivation.
All of this builds off what governments in Tucson, Tempe, and Phoenix have already passed in their respective cities. Earlier this year, the city of Tucson finalized its climate action plan to the tune of $326 million. And it’s ripe with Green New Deal mandates that are aimed at controlling citizens’ lives, forcing them out of their cars, and destroying the community.
Then, there’s the Tempe City Council which claims to have created a road map to address the immediate threat of “extreme heat.” As part of its plan, the city will be implementing green codes and standards that it believes will create a more walkable and cooler Tempe. Maybe someone should tell the Tempe City Council that we live in a desert and the so-called “extreme heat” they think they can control has always been a normal part of Arizona summers.
Of course, we can’t forget about Phoenix, where Rep. Ruben Gallego has also jumped on the “extreme heat” bandwagon by lobbying for more federal dollars to counter it. And Mayor Kate Gallego has urged the Biden administration to declare Arizona’s heat a federal emergency to, you guessed it, grab more federal funding. The City of Phoenix passed its climate action plan in 2021 with a goal to reduce emissions by 50 percent by 2030 and achieve net-zero emissions by 2050. Keep in mind that this is the same Phoenix that implemented “cool” pavement that is making people hotter and wants to eliminate parking spaces in an effort to become a 15-minute city. And on top of that, its current mayor is helping to lead a globalist effort to ban meat, dairy, and private cars by 2030.
This is the agenda MAG has chosen to join. Now, with this grant, it will be actively working with the rest of the cities in Maricopa County to adopt climate action plans just like these. And with that, MAG has made its true motivations clear. It is nothing more than a puppet for the Biden administration and the Left.
Help Protect Freedom in Arizona by Joining Our Grassroots Network
Arizona needs to have a unified voice promoting economic freedom and prosperity, and the Free Enterprise Club is committed to making that happen. But we can’t do it alone. We need YOU!
Join our FREE Grassroots Action List to stay up to date on the latest battles against big government and how YOU can help influence crucial bills at the Arizona State Legislature.
Recent Comments