Governor Katie Hobbs is facing scrutiny for accepting a paid jaunt to Mexico to see the Arizona Diamondbacks play against the San Diego Padres. Someone took a video of a woman asking her who paid for the trip, and she responded, “None of your business.”
Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ-05), who is running against Hobbs for governor, criticized the trip. “Why would Katie Hobbs refuse to tell an Arizonan who paid for her trip to Mexico?” he posted on X. “What’s she hiding? Hobbs has a track record of avoiding sunlight, from her shadowy inauguration fund to vetoing transparency bills. Arizonans deserve to know the truth about who funds foreign trips for our governor. What’s Katie Hobbs hiding?”
After the outcry, Hobbs admitted that the trip was paid for by the Arizona Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, and that she would be reimbursing the government for the cost of the tickets. That chamber is run by Monica Villalobos, a co-chair of Hobbs’ 2023 transition team. The cost of the tickets originally came from the state’s protocol fund, Hobbs said.
AZCentral noted, “The chamber also lobbies at the state Capitol, that it paid for Hobbs’ travel would appear to fall into a category of lobbyist-funded support that Hobbs proposed banning earlier this year as part of an ethics and transparency reform package.”
Read the rest of the article