As hard as they tried, Pima County supervisors Sharon Bronson and Richard Elias along with County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry failed once again on Tuesday to silence Supervisor Ally Miller. Their latest efforts to marginalize Miller centered on a statement she made about not being ashamed about the white color of her skin to a long-time friend on Facebook.
Miller posted the comment from her personal Facebook page on a Saturday night. Yet, Democratic supervisors Sharon Bronson, and Richard Elias called for an investigation of Miller. They hoped that investigation would result in a censure of Miller.
Responding to attacks on President Donald Trump and his supporters for the violence that occurred in Charlottesville, Miller wrote: “I’m sick and tired of being hit for being white….It is all about making us feel like we need to apologize. I am WHITE-and proud of it! No apologies necessary.” Within minutes allegations were made that Miller was a white supremacist, racist and Nazi. An obviously coordinated attack was launched on Miller.
Board Chair Sharon Bronson ordered an investigation into Miller’s conduct and there were demands calling for Miller to resign. Bronson also directed Democrat County Attorney Barbara LaWall’s office to explore legal remedies against Miller.
Foiled again
Miller insisted the County Attorney’s legal opinions be released to the public on Tuesday. The opinions seem to show that Bronson and Huckelberry were grasping at straws and attempting to overreach their authority. Andrew Flagg, Chief Deputy County Attorney warned Bronson and Huckelberry about the overreach. He wrote, “I would caution the Board against taking any action that might be characterized as discipline, including censure.”
“A “censure” is ” [a]n official reprimand or condemnation ; an authoritative expression of disapproval or blame; reproach.” ‘ The formality and official nature of a censure implies that it is in effect a disciplinary action , even though it is in the form of a statement of reproach and includes no tangible form of punishment such as a fine, suspension, firing, or demotion. Thus, the question is whether the Board has authority to formally discipline Supervisor Miller for her private speech. I conclude that the Board has no clear authority to do so,” explained Flagg in the legal opinion.
Flagg notified the Board of their lack of authority two weeks before they scheduled a vote to censure her. This demonstrates that the actions they took had no other purpose but to rile up residents to support their attempted, but baseless power grab.
This wasn’t the first time Huckelberry and crew tried to usurp Miller’s authority. It also wasn’t the first time they were cautioned about their attacks on Miller.
In 2016, Deputy Pima County Attorney Regina Nassen was forced to prevent an attack by Huckelberry. According to emails obtained by the ADI, Huckelberry was planning to attack Miller because she was actively exposing questionable and in some cases illegal expenditures.
In that case, Huckelberry had sought to strip Miller of her right to participate in executive sessions based on nothing more than a paranoia belief he described in a draft memo to the board. Nassen pleaded in an email to Huckelberry, “Chuck, don’t send this memo. Please.”
“… Supervisor Miller, she has every right to discuss her policy concerns about the World View deal with Goldwater, and even to encourage them to file a lawsuit. What she does not have a right to do is share confidential information about the case with Manley, but we have no evidence that she has done so or, if we have another executive session, would do so. There is no basis to exclude her from an executive session if we have one.”
Few show to shout
Bronson aggressively recruited activists to attend Tuesday’s meeting and attack again Miller for her Facebook comments. Despite her best efforts, only a handful of activists attended the meeting.
A representative from Black Lives Matter passionately addressed the board. “You can have German pride, you can have Irish pride, you can have Lithuanian pride,” said the BLM representative. “You can have all kinds of pride, because those are cultures that… that … have a… actual cultural traditions and rituals and identities. But when you say I am white and proud, what you are saying is I embrace a designation of superiority.”
The previously calm BLM representative began to lose control when supporters of Miller started to address the board. Bronson was forced to call for order several times as the BLM representative tried to prevent others from speaking by shouting over them. The BLM representative stormed out of the boardroom shouting “fuck you” and gesturing to the audience with a raised middle finger.
“This was nothing more than a political witch hunt from the Democrat Board majority and the local media because I am a supporter of President Donald Trump,” Miller said in a press release issued after the meeting. “It is not surprising that this board and a majority of local media supporting the Democratic board wish to silence my rights to free speech or any opinions they disagree with.”
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Legal opinions: Board Authority to Censure Board Member over Facebook Comment Applicability of Board of Supervisors Policy C 2.1 to Supervisor Miller’s Facebook comment |