http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/knau/local-knau-920384.mp3
Phoenix, AZ – Thomas, who until recently was the Maricopa County Attorney, has
gained a certain amount of notoriety with the investigations he
and Sheriff Joe Arpaio conducted of county supervisors and
judges. Those probes led to indictments which eventually were
thrown out. Meanwhile the state Bar of Arizona is investigating
Thomas' activities. And there are reports the FBI is looking into
whether whether Thomas abused his powers. While votes continue to
be tabulated, Thomas expressed confidence he still would win. But
he said he's not just facing Horne.
(Obviously, what's going on is the Obama justice department wants
to smear me so they they can install the Democrat as attorney
general and scuttle SB 1070.)
Obama himself?
(I'm not saying the president is behind it. But the justice
department, to the extent that's true, and I'm here fighting
shadows because these things have been leaked and there's no
actual evidence this is going on. But what they're doing is
they're smearing the sheriff and they're smearing me to try to
affect the election and frankly to try to protect some of the
people you've reported on who were subject to legitimate
corruption investigations.)
Thomas never explained how working to defeat him in a Republican
primary would help, since Horne said he also supports that new
state immigration law. And as to those friends of the Obama
administration, several of the supervisors Thomas indicted are
Republicans.
(Here's the bottom line: You have the homeland security chief and
the U.S. attorney who are close political allies with people we
prosecute. That's a fact. How do they deal with that? I
encouraged the press in the course of this campaign to finally go
and ask them some tough questions.)
Doesn't that sound a little paranoid?
(No, it's true. Here's the problem. There's been no confirmation
of that. These are smears in an election year. And they're coming
from the same Justice Department, apparently that wants to tube
SB 1070. And they want the Democrat in there as attorney general
because the Democrats all oppose SB 1070. It's quite a mess of
gumbo soup we're dealing with.)
The race between Horne and Thomas isn't the only one undecided.
Felecia Rotellini and David Lujan remain locked in a close
contest for the Democratic nomination for attorney general. For
Arizona Public Radio this is Howard Fischer.