PHOENIX (AP) — A federal judge in Phoenix on Friday refused to put on hold her order requiring phone records of the Arizona Republican Party leader to be turned over to the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, pending an appeal.
U.S. District Judge Diane Humetewa said state GOP Chair Kelli Ward had failed to show that she would suffer irreparable harm if congressional investigators for the records. And she again rejected Ward's claims that her First Amendment rights would be chilled if investigators were able to learn whom she spoke with while trying to challenge former President Donald Trump's 2020 election defeat.
Humetewa said she found Ward's “alleged concern speculative — and in light of disclosures made during oral argument — dubious.”
She noted that Ward's lawyers pointed out at a Tuesday hearing that she had written a book about sending an alternate slate of fake presidential electors to Congress and filmed multiple videos of her actions and posted them on YouTube.
“These actions belie Ms. Ward’s concern that her communications with her constituents or colleagues will be chilled by (the phone company's) possible disclosure of who she spoke with during that time,” Humetewa wrote.
The House committee investigating the Capitol attack is seeking phone records from just before the November 2020 election to Jan. 31, 2021. That would include a period when Ward was pushing for Trump’s election defeat to be overturned and...
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