Not Always A Smoking Gun

Communication records between an activist and Republican lawmakers didn't turn up anything important

In the several years I’ve been reporting, I’ve probably sent a thousand records requests and I can’t remember how many of them didn’t turn up anything –– or as the headline states, there wasn’t a smoking gun.

It’s common and important to recognize that there won’t always be a “there there” when looking for a story, but that doesn’t make the documents any less valuable.

After seeing Lyle Rapacki, a Republican activist and part-time Satanism expert, pop up in “audit” records from the American Oversight and Arizona Republic court cases, I became curious just how involved he really was.

Some documents showed he knew about Cyber Ninjas before it was made public, and others, as Republic’s Robert Anglen reported, showed Rapacki was in charge of finding “audit” volunteers to count the ballots at Veterans Memorial Coliseum.

In June I sent this request to the Arizona House and Senate:

All communication records between all Republican lawmakers and Lyle Rapacki between Nov. 3, 2020 and May 31, 2022. This should include: emails, text messages, voicemails, Facebook messages, calendar invites etc. If these messages contain attached documents, photos or videos, please include them with the request.

• I also specified to include non azleg email addresses because as previous records have shown, Senate President Karen Fann (aka the “audit queen”) uses multiple email addresses (sometimes seen as a way to skirt public records law, which is false). Wendy Rogers also uses her campaign email address to respond to reporters (does she ever respond?) instead of her legislative email.

The records I received were not extensive. And did not include any form of communicating outside of emails.¹

• In the Senate, I received 11 pages. Pete Galvan², the Arizona Senate’s associate rules attorney, worked with me about what I wanted included in there. He specified about including both current and former GOP senators and only including mass distribution emails/newsletters if a lawmaker issued a response.

• As you’ll notice with the House records, that was not agreed upon with their attorney and it’s a lesson learned on my behalf to make those specifications in the future because holy shit Lyle Rapacki sends so many of those.

The Senate records were mostly from soon-to-be former Sen. Kelly Townsend communicating with Rapacki through her assistant. There was one repeat email included: An invitation to a “legislative hearing in Tucson” from December 2021. But the thing I found most interesting is Rapacki emailed Townsend, Rogers, Sonny Borrelli and Gowan in the Senate and Mark Finchem, Leo Biasiucci and Judy Burges in the House. Only Townsend and Gowan used their legislative email addresses.

The others used these: Sonny Borrelli <Sonny4LD5@hotmail.com>; Leo Biasiucci <leobiasiucci@gmail.com>; Mark Finchem <markfinchem@me.com>; Judy Burges <burgesjudy@gmail.com>; Wendy Rogers <wendyjrogers@gmail.com>

I’m highly skeptical none of the others responded which likely means they opted to not turn over their communications with Rapacki, which brings me to the House and the 435 pages turned over to me.

• As addressed above, Biassiucci, Burges and Finchem were addressed on that invite, but those records did not turn up from the House. Either they weren’t turned over to my request or they deleted the emails. If it’s the latter, that’s a deletion of a public record which is classified as a felony. I’m inclined to believe they just didn’t hand them over.

• Almost all 435 pages were in the form of mass emails from Rapacki just repurposing all his batshit thoughts and theories about various topics, but mostly the election and Covid.

• Burges was involved in all of the communications meaning she complied with the request so I’m thankful for that.

• The most interesting email in all of the records I found was a conspiracy theory that Republicans were all out to get Burges in her re-election bid for the House in Legislative District 1. The email was sent from a constituent in February, Burges forwarded it to Rapacki saying, “This is what I was referring to in the text message.”

• Burges lost her primary on August 2 to Rep. Quang Nguyen and Selina Bliss.

I reached out to Burges to see if she thinks that’s why she lost. I did not hear back before publishing.

If you browse through the records and find something interesting, please pass it along so I can share!

1

Since state lawmakers do not have state-issued phones, it’s more difficult for public records officials to search and review responsive records and up to the lawmakers to voluntarily turn everything over. They seldom do. Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich wrote in a 2017 opinion that records pertaining to state business are public records even if on a personal device.

2

Quick shoutout to Pete Galvan who could not be more helpful when it comes to receiving records from the Arizona Senate. The bar is low from government workers who are willing to actually help with media requests or public records but Galvan goes above and beyond. He always asks questions to clarify what is being requested, updates without follow up emails and honors requests across multiple emails without an issue. He has also sent me records month after months from the same request almost a year ago without having me issue a new request every time. Nobody else does that. Thanks Pete!