Latest news with #JanaeShamp
USA Today
14-07-2025
- Politics
- USA Today
Janae Shamp got axed from Arizona Senate GOP leadership. Now she's hitting back
Sen. Janae Shamp blames Senate President Warren Petersen for her dramatic demotion last month, saying he disrespected her and her conservative ideas. Last November, Shamp's fellow Republicans elected her as Senate majority leader, the No. 2 position in the Arizona Senate. A majority of the same group voted her out of the job last month. A second-term senator from Surprise, Shamp said the ouster followed months of poor treatment, like excluding her from budget meetings, ignoring her input and slighting Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, during his visit in April. "I was completely and totally boxed out from the very beginning," Shamp said in a July 9 phone interview with The Arizona Republic about her experience this year in Senate leadership, adding she could not explain Petersen's behavior toward her. Petersen, R-Gilbert, denied Shamp's allegations and said her actions alone caused most Republican senators to turn against her. "It wasn't me versus her," he said. "If it was, she wouldn't have been removed by a two-thirds vote." The hostile relationship between the two highlights the divisions among Republicans who are already looking to next year's elections. Shamp was booted from her leadership role on June 27 by the vote of her colleagues, just minutes after the Legislature adjourned sine die for the year following a chaotic budget process. The Republican senators replaced her with veteran lawmaker Sen. John Kavanagh, chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, who had taken a lead role in budget negotiations with Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs. Who is Sen. Janae Shamp? Shamp, a surgery nurse often seen at the state Capitol wearing a cowboy hat, is a self-described constitutional conservative endorsed by now-President Donald Trump during her 2022 legislative campaign. After being reelected last year, she won the job of Senate majority leader by a vote of the 16 other Republican senators. She's used her time in office to push forward conservative legislation that often received public attention, sponsoring bills to charge doctors with a crime if they fail to try to save the life of a fetus in a botched abortion and to make doctors pay for reversing gender transition procedures. Hobbs vetoed both of those bills. Last year, Shamp sponsored the Senate version of the Arizona Border Invasion Act that Hobbs ultimately vetoed, a bill to make crossing the international border a state offense. Republicans passed a second version of the vetoed bill, referring it to the ballot. Voters approved the measure, Proposition 314, by a vote of nearly two-to-one. But its main provisions have not gone into effect, pending court approval to go into effect. Health care is one of Shamp's biggest priorities, and she sees the issue through a sharp, right-wing lens. She has remarked repeatedly on the campaign trail how she was fired from a nursing job for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine during the pandemic. In 2023, she chaired the Arizona Senate's Novel Coronavirus Southwestern Intergovernmental Committee, a two-day event criticized for providing unscientific information. Shamp said she's connected to Kennedy through two people she met in her first term, Dr. Peter McCullough and Kennedy's general counsel, Aaron Siri, who lives in Arizona. Both are well-known vaccine skeptics: McCullough had two of his certifications revoked by the American Board of Internal Medicine after he spread misinformation, including alleged dangers about COVID-19 vaccines, and Siri petitioned the federal Food and Drug Administration last year to revoke approval for the Hepatitis B and polio vaccines. "I'm not going to say I'm really very close, but I'm pretty close with HHS and with the Trump administration," she said. "I get invited to be in meetings, I get invited to be involved and I get requests for my input." Petersen: Shamp lacked experience Republican House and Senate members elected their leaders in November after maintaining their majority in each chamber in November's election. Rep. Steve Montenegro of Goodyear, an ally and seatmate of Shamp who also represents Legislative District 29 in the northwest Valley, became the new House speaker. Shamp said she heard from other senators that Petersen had been urging them to vote for Kavanagh as majority leader. Petersen acknowledged he had preferred Kavanagh for the majority leader position and that his choice wasn't personal. "It was literally just a matter of experience," he said. "She's never been a chairman. It was just her second term." Shamp has several allies in the Senate and reportedly won by one vote in the closed leadership meeting in November. Arizona Senate: Republicans shake up leadership team after contentious budget fights Shamp says she was made to look 'stupid' Shamp said she and Petersen hadn't gotten along even before she won the majority leader position. They never talked privately, she said, and she had never been a fan of his budget plans, which involved divvying up any surplus left over in budgets after all the basic requirements had been fulfilled and giving millions to each Republican lawmaker to spend as they saw fit. She would have favored pooling surplus funds for "tons of infrastructure projects that haven't been funded" and tackling public health problems, she said. She began writing a majority plan before the 2025 legislative session began, she said, but Petersen told her it was already being done by someone else and she'd get to proofread the document when it was finished. He relented, she said, "and that was probably the only part of my job of majority leader that I was truly allowed to do." She said she "never felt like I was part of the team" and sometimes wasn't given information she needed to run the Senate floor. "All I do is I get a script and I'm told like a monkey to read it," she said. She made occasional procedural mistakes, she believes made the whole Senate look bad because she was "never allowed to know" what was going on, she said. "Staff would belittle me when I would ask," she said, adding she once told a Senate secretary: "I feel like I keep getting set up to look stupid." Petersen roundly denied Shamp's claims of being ostracized from leadership talks or that he or Senate staff withheld information she needed. "Not accurate," he said. "She would come in late, or missed leadership meetings. But she was always invited to every meeting." Sen. T.J. Shope, a Coolidge Republican who has been in the Legislature since 2012 and serves as Senate president pro tempore, backed up Petersen's statement that Shamp was invited to leadership meetings but often came in late. However, Sen. David Gowan, R-Sierra Vista, said Shamp has always been "rocksteady" with other Senate members. "Majority Leader Shamp interacted with the Senators on and off the floor with great attention to their needs, no matter what the issues were," Gowan told the Republic in a text message. "And, it was a sad day for the Great State of Arizona when those members decided to move on from this great fighter!" Kennedy appearance didn't go as Shamp wanted Even "bringing" Kennedy to the state Legislature failed to win her "any kind of inclusion in the conversations about what we needed to do with budget and policy," she said. "All that did was literally get me called a b----." Kennedy had embarked on a tour of three Southwest states in April to tout his Make America Healthy Again program and support a bill in Arizona to remove certain ultra-processed foods and dyes from school meals. Hobbs ultimately signed the bill. "It was an incredible day," Shamp said of Kennedy's April 8 visit. "It should have been better." She was "very disappointed" that earlier in the day, Tom Homan, Trump's border czar, addressed senators and House members in a joint meeting on the floor of the state House. But she said she was denied a request to have Kennedy introduced on the floor of the state Senate. The meeting was instead held in a hearing room. She suspected the reason was the personality problem between her and Petersen. Later, she was told a senate staffer whom she would not identify called her a "b----" because she wouldn't allow anyone in her office during a private meeting that day with Kennedy. "I was given strict instructions that no one — no one — would be involved in this meeting, and that if the Secretary decided he wanted to take pictures with folks, that he would do that." Instead of insults, she said, she should have been praised for "elevating the health of our state." Asked whether he had denied Shamp's request to host Kennedy on the Senate floor, Petersen said he hadn't and checked with his staff to see what happened, later saying Shamp apparently had never put in a request. Perhaps she had asked to host a press conference on the Senate floor, he said. But he added that he had no evidence of that, and even if so, press conferences are never allowed on the Senate floor. Shamp exposed rift with budget votes Under Montenegro's leadership, the House ultimately passed two doomed budget plans for the state's fiscal year 2025-2026 strictly on GOP party lines. The House speaker played the role of antagonist to Petersen during the final budget negotiations, claiming the House plans were more conservative than the Senate plan. Shamp sided with him instead of the Senate president. The proposed House budgets spent less money and included conservative measures pushed by the Arizona Freedom Caucus, like a ban on in-state tuition at public universities for undocumented residents in spite of a voter-approved, 2022 law legalizing the lower tuition when students live in the state, regardless of immigration status. Petersen and Kavanagh negotiated their budget with Hobbs, other Senate Republicans, and Democrats in the Senate and House. They sought to please the Republican majority but crucially, present Hobbs with something she would sign before the June 30 deadline for a spending plan. Shamp declined to allocate her share of the surplus money and was denied information about what was in the bills needed to enact the budget and the fiscal spreadsheets, she said. She retweeted a post on by House Appropriations Chair Rep. David Livingston stating "the Governor, with the help of a RINO Senate President, is pushing a Democrat Budget." Shamp voted against the Senate plan with several other senators who didn't like the plan or the process, including Sen. Jake Hoffman, a Queen Creek Republican who is the Freedom Caucus chair. Like Livingston, a major hang-up for Shamp was the lack of preparation for the likely impact on Arizona's budget because of federal Medicaid cuts. "It's called fiscal responsibility," she said. Sen. Frank Carroll, a Sun City West Republican who was elected majority whip in November, was also one of the five GOP senators who voted against the first Senate budget plan with Shamp. He kept his leadership job. Shamp and all but two Republican senators voted for the final, $17.6 billion Senate budget plan on June 27, which was similar to its first plan but included additions by the House, like construction projects on State Route 347 south of metro Phoenix. Hoffman voted against the final plan, and Shope — who voted for the first plan — was out of town. Hobbs signed the budget in a July 1 ceremony, noting that the plan wouldn't cover the federal cuts in Arizona. A new majority leader: 5 moments that defined Arizona's topsy-turvy 2025 legislative session Shope: Leadership means 'you kind of serve two masters' Shope, the Senate president pro tempore, believed most Republican senators voted to remove her from leadership not because of her resistance to the overall Senate budget, but because she had seconded motions to include conservative provisions from the House budget plans. Hobbs was sure to reject a plan with those provisions. But even worse, some members felt voting against the provisions would make them "look bad" to some conservatives, meaning they could be targeted for replacement in next year's primary election, Shope said. Her fundraising efforts for the Arizona Conservative Policy Alliance PAC have also been a source of contention for Petersen because it helps fund campaigns for Republican legislative candidates in primary elections. The Arizona Senate Victory Fund PAC, which Petersen helps manage, only funds candidates in the general election to avoid appearing biased toward any Republicans in the primaries. "I think that the president was probably kind of almost personally offended" by her work on the Arizona Conservative Policy Alliance PAC, Shope said. "I think that what people don't realize is the amount of free agency that you lose whenever you decide that you're going to become part of leadership," Shope said. "You kind of serve two masters. You have obviously your constituents, but you also have a caucus of members." What's next for Shamp? Petersen said that after she was stripped of her leadership role, he offered her the chair of the Senate Education Committee, saying he would relocate the current chair, Sen. David Farnsworth. Shamp declined, believing she should be the chair of the Health and Human Services Committee instead of its current chair, Sen. Carine Werner, R-Scottsdale. Shamp said she would vote the same way on the budget again, despite the "retribution," and said she would not have to worry about the same "restraints" now that she's not in leadership. She'll keep working on the issues she believes are important and continue to fundraise for the PAC to ensure quality Republican candidates for the Legislature next year, she said. An "activist arm" in the GOP has supported "some pretty bad candidates" in the past, she said. "Poor, good, solid conservatives were left to fend for themselves in these bloody, ugly primaries because you've got Freedom Caucus and Turning Point money coming and helping. How is that fair?" she asked. People have told her "you need to be the next Senate president" if Petersen resigns as expected to focus on his run for state attorney general next year, she said. But she said she has no higher political aspirations. "I just want to do what's best and what's right for my beloved state," she said. Reach the reporter at rstern@ or 480-276-3237. Follow him on X @raystern.
Fox News
03-06-2025
- Business
- Fox News
Dem governor ripped as 'total disgrace' after vetoing bill limiting Chinese land ownership near military bases
Arizona Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs, who is up for reelection this year, garnered backlash Tuesday after vetoing a bill aimed at preventing China from buying up land next to strategic assets, such as military bases. Arizona state Senate Majority Leader Janae Shamp said the "politically motivated veto" was "utterly insane," blaming Hobbs for being "an obstructionist against safeguarding our citizens from threats." However, Hobbs said the bill, S.B. 1109, was "ineffective at counter-espionage" and did not "directly protect" American military assets in the state. Chinese investment in land near military bases has become an increasing concern for national security hawks. Shamp, in her efforts to get the now-vetoed bill passed, cited recent Chinese attempts to lease buildings alongside Arizona's Luke Air Force Base, where the military trains fighter pilots. "Governor Hobbs's veto of SB 1109 hangs an 'Open for the CCP' sign on Arizona's front door, allowing Communist China to buy up American land near critical assets like Luke Air Force Base, Palo Verde nuclear power plant, and Taiwan Semiconductor's growing fabrication footprint," said Michael Lucci, the CEO and founder of State Armor Action, a conservative group with a mission to develop and enact state-level solutions to global security threats. "Allowing Communist China to buy up land near our critical assets is a national security risk, plain and simple, and Governor Hobbs is substantively and completely wrong when she says that SB 1109 'is ineffective at counter-espionage and does not directly protect our military assets,'" Lucci added. Lucci pointed to Ukraine's recent drone attacks that destroyed significant numbers of Russian military aircraft, noting that "proximity produces peril in asymmetric warfare." S.B. 1109, which can still pass if the Arizona legislature overrides Hobbs' veto, would have prohibited the People's Republic of China from having a 30%, or more, stake in Arizona property. Hobbs, in her defense of the veto, added that in addition to being ineffective at countering Chinese espionage efforts, the bill lacked "clear implementation criteria," which opened the door for "arbitrary enforcement." However, the bill went through a bipartisan amendment process in an effort to assuage those concerns that the legislation might lead to discrimination in land sales, according to local outlet the AZ Mirror. The initial version of the bill banned certain people and entities deemed to be national security threats from buying up land in Arizona, but following subsequent amendments the bill only sought to ban Chinese government-linked entities and its subsidiaries. In addition to Arizona, other states have proposed or passed legislation aimed at curtailing Chinese land grabs in the United States. Congress has also taken steps in an effort to effectuate change through national policy. As of March 17, according to the China-focused nonprofit Committee of 100, 27 states are currently considering 84 bills aimed at restricting foreign property ownership in some way, while Congress is currently considering seven separate bills addressing the issue. So far, the committee indicated, 22 states have passed bills restricting foreign property ownership, 17 of which were passed into law in 2024.
Fox News
21-02-2025
- Health
- Fox News
DAVID MARCUS: Detransitioning is actual 'gender-affirming care,' so why won't insurance cover it?
It is a rather competitive category, but high on the list of the most Orwellian newspeak terms of the 21st Century is "gender-affirming care." This vile euphemism seeks to hide the fact that what it really means is irreversible medical procedures often used on children confused about their gender. But these days, more and more young people are detransitioning, accepting the reality of their sex, and seeking medical care to reverse what was done to them when they thought they could change their gender. This is a kind of "gender-affirming care" we should all get behind. A recent study showed that two-thirds of kids who suffer from gender dysphoria change their minds when they become adults, which is a clear and obvious argument as to why no child should ever medically transition. But what about those who go through with chemical or even surgical procedures, only to come to regret it? Chloe Cole, who has become an activist detransitioner, has written about her experience after beginning medical transition at age 12, something her doctors enthusiastically approved of. And what happened a few years later when she sought to reverse the transition? Here is how she described the situation she and others have faced to the New York Post: "…the same medical establishment that encouraged them suddenly ignores them. They'll struggle to get the mental-health care they need. They'll struggle to get the treatments and surgeries they need. And they and their families will struggle to find health insurance that pays for their medical needs. Instead, they'll pay through the nose for decades to come." Think about this. Insurance companies will crawl over broken glass to pay for the mutilation of children in the name of progressive religion, but many won't spend a dime to undo the tragic harm they have done. Insurance companies will crawl over broken glass to pay for the mutilation of children in the name of progressive religion, but many won't spend a dime to undo the tragic harm they have done. Last year, Arizona State Sen. Janae Shamp introduced a bill that would require insurance companies to pay for detransitioning. She said at the time of these companies, "They haven't even set up codes to be able to diagnose. That's unheard of in the medical world. And that means we have a political ideology directing it. And that has to stop." In North Carolina, Prisha Mosley is suing the doctors who performed procedures to make her appear male. According to the lawsuit: "These individuals whom Prisha trusted to care for her lied to and misled her into these treatments and procedures for the purpose of making money off of her and bolstering their credentials in the emerging field of so-called 'gender-affirming care." Instead of taking these tragic and ever-growing cases of detransition seriously, the medical establishment and the media are often dismissive, if not outright hostile to them. Take a 2023 New York Times headline that read, "How a few stories of regret fuel the push to restrict gender transition care." The attitude of the Gray Lady here, and of most of the Democratic Party, seems to be something along the lines of, 'Sure, a few people might change their minds after it's too late, but we can't let that stop us from chemically and surgically altering the bodies of confused minors.' At best, this attitude is insane. At worst, it is evil. Congress should act with all due expediency to pass legislation that compels any insurance company that pays for gender transition to also pay for detransition. It is honestly just plain common sense. Further, legal barriers, such as statutes of limitation, should be stripped away for those who were duped by doctors and mental health experts more concerned with ideological purity than their patients' well-being. Public attitudes about the trans issue have moved strongly in the past decade, with majorities of Americans saying there are only two sexes and that men should not compete in women's sports. It's time for our laws to catch up to this reality. But swaying public opinion was only step one. Now, the machinery and infrastructure of gender-bending child mutilation must be attacked on all fronts, not just with lawsuits, but in guarantees that detransitioning is also paid for. It is as if America is waking up from a strange dream, one in which reality did not quite exist, in which the confused whims of children became written as scars on their bodies, and in the light of day, we comprehend its horror. Now is the time to act, not just to ban any medical transitioning of children, but also to assure that those who have undergone such procedures have the resources to access actual gender-affirming care, and undo what can be undone.
