Ducey Uses Taxpayer-Funded Event to Shoot Campaign Video

In case you missed it, Doug Ducey staged a taxpayer funded campaign event as a press conference in a vain attempt to get some shots of him doing his job. Yesterday, Ducey summoned state and local federal officials to sing his praises. Among the invited guests at this taxpayer funded event? Ducey’s campaign videographer and photographer, there to document the “press conference.”
Is there any question as to why Ducey would throw together this glorified campaign event on the taxpayers dime? Maybe it has something to do with the fact that nearly two-thirds of Arizonans want to see someone else in the governor’s mansion. Or maybe it has to do with the way he created and then mismanaged the teacher pay crisis.
“With poll after poll showing Ducey underwater, it’s no surprise he would use taxpayer money to put together a sham presser,” says Democratic Governors Association Deputy Communications Director David Turner. “It is a shame that Ducey has such little regard for Arizonans he would rather use taxpayer dollars on campaign events than for the education programs he has cut.”
You can read excerpts below, or the full article HERE:
Ducey, facing re-election this year, invited the media to the event at the Department of Public Safety. In a prepared speech, the Republican governor said the state and its partners stepped in because calling on the federal government to secure the border “too often … has been met with empty words and little action.”
But Ducey’s remarks in the closed hangar had another audience: a videographer and photographer who also were invited — and who were recording all this for a future campaign commercial.
The governor, questioned about having campaign photographers videotaping what was billed as a press conference put on with taxpayer resources, insisted there was nothing improper about the event or their taping it for his campaign.
“This is a public event,” Ducey said. “Anyone who wants to come can come.”
But this time, only the media — and Ducey’s campaign — were notified, and less than 24 hours earlier, that he was going to provide “the latest updates on the Arizona Border Strike Force.”
In fact, that invite was conditional: Only after those who received it said they wanted to cover the event were they given the location.