A Republican calls out rank politics and ‘performative outrage' amid split on animal welfare bill
One GOP state lawmaker has had it with the 'performative outrage' of some of the far-right members of his own party.
During a debate about a proposed bill that would strengthen consequences for people convicted of animal abuse, Rep. Walt Blackman engaged in a heated exchange on May 20 with fellow Republican Rep. Alexander Kolodin on the floor of the Arizona House of Representatives.
Kolodin, a Scottsdale Republican and member of the far-right Arizona Freedom Caucus, criticized Senate Bill 1658 for what he described as putting the wellbeing of pets above that of their owners, especially owners who are homeless or living in poverty.
Blackman, who comes from Snowflake and describes himself as a traditional Reagan Republican, had just days earlier made a lengthy post on the social media site X calling out his far-right GOP colleagues for 'spend(ing) more energy policing ideological purity than drafting legislation.'
'It's got nothing to do with the bill,' Blackman said on May 20, in response to Kolodin's criticisms. 'It's got to do with politics. I've been down here (at the Capitol) enough.'
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The proposed legislation at the center of the debate was originally introduced by Republican Sen. Shawnna Bolick via Senate Bill 1234, which passed through the Senate with near-unanimous support but never got a committee hearing in the House.
Blackman revived the bill via a strike-everything amendment (an amendment that wholly replaces the text of the original bill) to Bolick's Senate Bill 1658. Numerous animal rights organizations supported the measure, including the Arizona Humane Society and the Maricopa County Attorney's Office.
Blackman is a U.S. Army combat veteran who said that he considers his dogs to be family members and that he, like many other veterans, depends on them to help him through the mental and emotional impacts of his time in the military.
'It is making sure that people who have dogs, that they are being responsible, that they are making sure that they are giving them clean water, that they are giving them the proper amount of food to eat,' Blackman said. 'This is a no-brainer piece of legislation.'
The proposed law that Blackman was advocating for would add failure to provide suitable and species-appropriate food, water and shelter to the definition of animal neglect in Arizona. It would also expand the definition of animal cruelty to include 'intentionally, knowingly or recklessly' failing to provide medical attention necessary to prevent unreasonable suffering.
'I don't know why this body would want to be so cruel as to make it a serious crime for poor people to own pets,' Kolodin said of the proposal.
The bill includes carve-outs to the shelter requirement for working dogs, including livestock herding and guardian dogs, as well as for the pets of people who don't have a permanent residence themselves.
A clearly frustrated Blackman reminded Kolodin of those exceptions, to which Kolodin countered that there was not an exception for the medical care requirement.
'If you can't afford to give (medical care) to yourself or your kids, you're not breaking the law. But if you can't afford to give it to the family dog, now you're a criminal,' Kolodin said. 'That is cruel.'
Kolodin called the proposal 'inhumane.'
Blackman responded by pointing out that 'some of his colleagues' might want to think back on some of the cruel and inhumane votes or comments they've previously made on the House floor.
A lot of things that I did as a Republican, I am not proud of.
– Rep. Walt Blackman, R-Snowflake
Members of the Arizona Freedom Caucus were some of the only legislators who voted against the final version of an emergency funding bill last month to ensure that Arizonans with disabilities didn't lose access to vital caregiving and health services.
'We would love for every person in this state to get proper medical attention,' Kolodin said. 'We would love for every person in this state to have nourishing food and water. We would love that. And we would love for every dog in this state to have those things too. But guess what? That is not reality.'
Blackman told the Arizona Mirror in a May 22 phone interview that he was surprised that Kolodin said that on the House floor — not because Blackman thinks it was disingenuous, but because it doesn't align with the Arizona Freedom Caucus agenda.
Kolodin, along with other Freedom Caucus members, have voted in favor of strengthening rules and restrictions on the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which provides assistance to low income people to purchase food. They've also supported cuts to Medicaid, and the services it provides, including when they voted against the emergency funding bill for the Division of Developmental Disabilities last month.
They have also supported legislation to criminalize homelessness.
Blackman said that, as he sees it, members of the Freedom Caucus seem to always be voting against bipartisan legislation not based on the merits of the proposals, but based on a political scorecard.
And statements from the group's leader, Sen. Jake Hoffman, at the start of the 2025 legislative session seem to back that up. During a January press conference, Hoffman said that the Freedom Caucus' top priority over the next two years would be to make sure that the Democrats who head statewide offices, including Gov. Katie Hobbs, lose their 2026 reelection campaigns.
Blackman clashed earlier this year with Arizona Freedom Caucus member Sen. Wendy Rogers, of Flagstaff, when she blocked a bill that he sponsored which criminalized acts of stolen valor at the state level. Stolen valor means lying about or embellishing one's military service.
Rogers and Blackman represent the same legislative district, but are political opponents, and she endorsed Steve Slaton over Blackman in the 2024 GOP primary election. Slaton, who owns The Trumped Store in Show Low, is a Trump loyalist like Rogers. But during his campaign, Slaton was found to have falsely claimed that he saw combat in Vietnam during his time in the U.S. Army.
Blackman and Kolodin engaged in another heated exchange in April, after Blackman reintroduced his stolen valor bill as a strike-everything amendment to another bill originally sponsored by Bolick, circumventing Rogers' power to block it.
Kolodin supported the original version of the stolen valor bill when it passed through the House, but was the single dissenting vote when it was revived.
Kolodin said that the new version of Blackman's proposal included a provision that greatly expanded its scope: It says that any person convicted of the offense outlined in the bill would be disqualified from public office.
'We cannot open the door to allowing our courts to judge political speech within the context of criminal law,' Kolodin said.
Blackman, in a fiery response to Kolodin, said that the bill has nothing to do with politics or political speech.
'This has nothing to do with political speech. This has to do with blood, sweat and tears men and women left on the battlefield,' Blackman said, at times yelling. 'The next time we have a conflict, I'd like to see whoever says 'no' on this board or in the Senate to jump in a Humvee and get shot at and tell me the service didn't matter.'
Blackman told the Mirror that the first person he was criticizing in his May 18 social media post was himself. It was during a two-year reprieve from the state Capitol after serving as a state representative from 2019-2023 that he said he realized that he had gotten away from the values he believed in when he first joined the Republican Party in the 1980s.
'A lot of things that I did as a Republican, I am not proud of,' he said, admitting to his adherence to the 'it's our way or the highway' approach to governing that the GOP employed during his first stint as a lawmaker, when Republicans controlled the state House by a single vote.
Since he returned to the legislature in January, Blackman said he's committed to working across the aisle to make changes that help Arizonans instead of scoring political points simply by voting against legislation because Democrats support it.
Blackman said that he continues to support closed borders, lower taxes and free enterprise, 'however, I am not for putting my foot on somebody's neck just because they happen to disagree with me,' he said.
In the social media post, Blackman accused his party of moving away from what he described as the traditional Republican values of faith, freedom and force to 'focusing almost exclusively on grievance politics and cultural warfare.'
Blackman was one of several Republicans who voted for or expressed support for SB1658 during the May 20 debate.
Rep. Matt Gress, of Phoenix, described the legislation as 'morally right.'
'How we treat our animals matters a great deal to who we are as a society,' he said.
Gress mentioned the impetus for the proposal, a 2023 animal cruelty case in Chandler when 55 special needs dogs were found to be in poor health and living in 'horrible, horrible' conditions.
'We didn't have appropriate laws in place to hold those owners accountable,' he said.
Gress, who, like Blackman, has also been chastised by members of his party for voting alongside Democrats, praised bipartisan support for the proposal. The bill will still have to make it past a full vote on the House floor and Senate, as well as a signature from the governor before it becomes law.
'This is a good bill, OK?' Blackman said during the May 20 debate. 'Don't abuse your dog. That's all it's saying. Don't abuse your dog. It doesn't say if a person does not have a place to go — somebody who cannot take care of their dog — they're not going to go to jail.'
Kolodin did not respond to a request for comment.
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