Sarah Huckabee Sanders rose to national prominence in part during her time at the lectern as White House press secretary, but the purchase of a $19,000 lectern for the Arkansas governor is undergoing scrutiny and prompting claims that records about it have been altered.
A legislative panel next week will take up a lawmaker’s request for an audit to review the purchase of the lectern, which was bought in June for $19,029.25 with a state credit card. The Arkansas Republican Party reimbursed the state last month for the wood-paneled and blue lectern, which the state received in August.
“From my experience, where we’re at with this particular thing is we need to allow legislative audit go in,” Republican Sen. Jimmy Hickey, who requested the audit, said. “Everyone knows them, they do their work, they’re very thorough and then they produce a detailed report that comes to the Legislature through an open committee.”
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Fellow Arkansan here. I love to get in on that Arkansas gossip.
Hold the fuck up, you can’t just call yourself an “Arkansan” when your ass backwards state is pronounced “Arc-en-saw.”
Oh I sure can! There is a reason we reside near the bottom in education. Leave us be.
It’s pronounced “Arc-en-sawn”
"englishmakesnofuckingsenseanyway
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Well because they represent more than half the population realistically.
This makes the most sense. I was wondering why so many people care about wood.
The republican state government blew 19 THOUSAND dollars on it, thats why people care. Its bullshit.
Even shitty states like Arkansas have budgets in the tens of billions of dollars; $19k is a rounding error. Nobody cares about $19k, unless it turns out to be a crime, which this might be.
Well that’s the issue. A podium like that normally costs a few hundred dollars max. So why was this one so expensive? Fraud is a crime.
That’s not to mention that podiums are mostly pointless anyways. You could just stand and talk just as easily without one.
If you paid taxes and are struggling to pay all your bills I could see why that would be infuriating
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Hickey was pushed out as state Senate leader, he has an axe to grind and isn’t afraid of a primary.
I’ve been slacking… I should’ve posted this over in /c/arkansas long ago.
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I’ll be honest… I only clicked on this article because I was curious as to what a $19,000 lectern looks like. 🤷
You’ll have to keep looking because this thing was <$1K on Amazon
Turns out, extremely yonic
The Arkansas Republican Party reimbursed the state last month for the wood-paneled and blue lectern, which the state received in August.
Is this typical for the party to reimburse the state for an elected official? If it was reimbursed from campaign funds, wouldn’t that be covered by campaign finance laws? Sounds like either the Republican Party is trying to cover it up by reimbursing for it, or they’re doing weird accounting to get through a loophole of campaign finance laws.
It’s a coverup. There only defense is “we made an oopsy. This was supposed to be bought with private funds and now it is after it became a clear case of grift. Nothing to see here, tee hee.”
Is there ever a time where it is above board for these types of reimbursements to happen? Seems like it should be something illegal already, but maybe there’s something I’m missing?
So is this how Republicans are supposedly such responsible stewards of taxpayer dollars?
Sheesh, she’s even giving the Pentagon a run for their money (no pun intended):
These Toilet Seat Lids Aren’t Gold-Plated but They Cost $14,000
Working as intended. Having the government overpay tenfold for goods and services is neoliberals favourite method of converting public funds into private profit.
Lord knows when I think of SHS and The Pentagon I think of neolibs.
I used to work in aerospace and we had a few government customers. Every single government part was sold to a contractor who then flipped it to the government for like 10x what they paid for it.
It was real annoying when they needed parts for old aircraft with deprecated specifications/components that were no longer available because the contractors had no engineering staff so we couldn’t ask them for clarification on which parts/specs to use beyond standard military supercessions which sometimes had no suitable replacements.
Why on earth would that cost 20 grand? That thing is ugly as fuck
You sound like someone that doesn’t know shit about fancy lecterns.
Of course it costs 20 grand, look at all that embellishment!
Sorry, I meant embezzlement.
It’s called money laundering.
They bought it on Temu. She wanted to shop like a billionaire.
As a amateur furniture maker, I could totally figure out how to make this thing cost $20k. It’d look so much cooler than this shit though…
“This is nothing more than a manufactured controversy by left-wing activists to distract from the bold conservative reforms the governor has signed into law and is effectively implementing in Arkansas,” Henning said in a statement.
Haha so I guess “bold conservative reforms” is their new code phrase for hatred and intolerance.
And “we had to buy a $19k lectern…it was to good a price to pass up”
The party of fiscal responsibility!
I can’t believe someone paid $19,000 for that ugly piece of junk.
They didn’t. This is graft in action
Someone paid $20.28 for that and $6.99 for a rattlecan of metallic blue, and then charged the other $19,000.00 for “labor”. (I’m optimistically assuming they paid tax on the store bought items)
Oh it’s even more blatant. She bought it from a friend, who then used the money to go on vacation. It’s a blatant kick back.
That’s the state that just wrecked child labor laws, right?
It should be removed one day and replaced with four empty boxes and a big lots desktop microphone.
lol literally nothing will happen because literally nothing ever does. Everything is farce now.
Republicunts. The original welfare queens.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The lectern’s purchase was first uncovered by Matthew Campbell, an attorney and blogger who has sued State Police for withholding records he had requested about Sanders’ travel and security.
Days after Campbell filed his initial suit, Sanders called a special legislative session and proposed broad exemptions to the state’s open records law.
Sanders signed into law a measure restricting the public’s access to her travel and security records after she and lawmakers backed off more widespread exemptions that faced backlash from media groups, transparency advocates and some conservatives.
According to Mars’ letter, the interference includes the governor’s office altering an invoice from Beckett Events LLC, the Virginia firm listed as the seller of the lectern.
“This is nothing more than a manufactured controversy by left-wing activists to distract from the bold conservative reforms the governor has signed into law and is effectively implementing in Arkansas,” Henning said in a statement.
Hickey’s request also asks for an audit of all matters regarding security and travel records for the governor or her office that were retroactively made confidential by the law she signed last month.
The original article contains 745 words, the summary contains 183 words. Saved 75%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
That thing is hideous.
As befits.
When you elect stinky fish, don’t be surprised when it starts to rot. Let’s be real, she should be nowhere in sight of a position of power.
