Sarah Huckabee Sanders scandal finally comes home to roost
If you blocked the unpleasant memory of Sarah Huckabee Sanders out of your minds — and I don’t blame you if you have — then permit me to refresh your memories. She was the most obnoxious, most self righteous and most dishonest of Trump’s obnoxious, self righteous and dishonest press secretaries. She was the press secretary between Sean Spicer and Kayleigh McEnany.
Sarah Huckabee Sanders was the one who arrogantly talked down to the press pool from the lectern in the White House press briefing room, routinely chastising them for not believing her lies. She frequently began every sentence with the word “Look.”
She talked to the press pool like a dysfunctional mother abusing her children. Ordinary, peace-living citizens found themselves wanting to scratch her eyes out. She had the charisma of Sidney Powell. Remember her now?
After leaving the press room she leveraged her infamy to run for governor of Arkansas. Enough stupid people live in Arkansas to elect her. She immediately went to work reminding everyone that she is a “Christian” and as such and in the self-righteous name of God she began persecuting her LGBTQ+ constituents and driving them out of the state, making the lives of those who chose to remain behind even more miserable.
Recently she signed an executive order to mandate the use of gender-specific terms when describing women and “prohibit the use of woke, anti-women words for official state government business.” You get the idea. She’s a barrel of laughs.
Recently she acknowledged that she spent $19,000 in state taxpayer funds on a lectern that she’s not even publicly using. She paid for it using a state credit card, and the Republican Party of Arkansas eventually reimbursed the state for the lectern, but only after a local blogger exposed the uncommonly expensive purchase.
While speaking to the press on Tuesday, the “Christian” governor Sanders explained that she would not be using the lectern, even though it was purchased specifically for her public utterances as governor, because the media would “talk about nothing else” if she used it for its intended purpose. She chastised reporters for daring to bring it up. It was just like old times.
But it turns out it’s all a lie. Here’s what really happened. Sanders “bought” a knock-off of a $4,000 lectern worth far, far less than that for the aforementioned whopping nineteen grand. She then funnelled the money to the business of a friend of hers who doesn’t even sell lecterns. The business is called Beckett Events LLC. Her friend is Virginia Beckett.
She had the record of this highly illegal, criminal transaction doctored to hide her theft. Then she stole the money and went to Paris and had a wild party, taking Virginia Beckett and other friends with her. Since the money wasn’t really theirs they had a great time spending it on expensive booze and food and wild times.
It turns out that an Arkansas Republican state Senator found out about Sanders’ crime and has since launched an investigation. The criminal details were obtained by the previously mentioned blogger using a FOIA request for state records.
Sanders’ response has been to try to get the right to such FOIA requests revoked for everyone. She maintains that expenses of important people like her shouldn’t be investigated. Has she been talking to Clarence Thomas?
By the way, the amount of $19,000 was carefully chosen. It turns out you have to officially report and fill out a long form justification for expenditures over $20,000. So the fictional amount for the fictional price of a fictional lectern was invented by “cunning” Sarah so she could commit the theft without getting noticed.
Sanders is now in panic mode. The Meidas Touch Network has made a viral video about what they call Lectern-gate. More than a million people have seen it and that number is growing rapidly.
Sanders continues to chastise the press for asking about the scandal — just like old times. But the scandal won’t go away, and dedicated Sarah-watchers intend to make sure that it never does until Sarah is impeached and criminally charged. And, as ever, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, comrades and friends, stay safe.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.