Jake Hoffman is a far-right
Republican extremist member of the Arizona House
of Representatives for Arizona's 15th district.
Hoffman runs a digital-marketing company, Rally
Forge. The Guardian reported that Rally Forge
also formed a fake left-wing front group,
America Progress Now, which promoted Green Party
candidates online in 2018. Rally Forge was
banned from Facebook in 2020 when Hoffman was
permanently suspended by Twitter. As of 2021, he
is the vice-chair of the Arizona House's
Committee on Government and Elections. After
Democratic candidate Joe Biden won the state of
Arizona in the 2020 election, Hoffman declared
himself an elector and attempted to submit
documents to the National Archive saying that
Arizona had been won by Republican candidate
Donald Trump. In
2022, Hoffman proposed to divide Maricopa County
into three new counties, since 65% of the
Arizona’s population is contained by that single
county. – (critics claimed that the proposal was
intended to punish election officials in
Maricopa County for not overturning the 2020
election results based on Trump's claims of
fraud). He is a founding state house member of
the pro-insurrectionist "Liberty
Caucus".
It did not take long
for Arizona’s new Gov. Katie Hobbs to show
her true colors. And it took even less time
for Republican lawmakers to show theirs. As
one of her first acts, Hobbs signed an
executive order directing the Department of
Administration to prohibit discrimination in
matters of hiring, promotion and pay based
on sexual orientation and gender identity.
Same with all new state contracts. In other
words, the governor wants to make sure the
state puts into practice the idea that all
Arizonans are “created equal,” a truth our
founders believed to be self-evident.
Although, apparently not to Republicans in
the Legislature’s so-called Arizona Freedom
Caucus. The newly formed group announced
that it will sue Hobbs over this executive
order and others. Republican Sen. Jake
Hoffman railed against “Katie Hobbs’ radical
woke agenda” and in a press release from the
group said, “We’re seeing a new breed of
Democratic Fascism take hold of the
governor’s office.” I’m not sure from what
history or civics class Hoffman came to
believe that extending equal protection
under the law to all citizens is “woke,”
since that would make the U.S. Constitution
“woke.” I also don’t believe Hoffman quite
understands what is meant by “fascism.”
Although he should, since he has actively
tried to institute it.
As Democratic
lawmakers applauded Hobbs’ education agenda,
Republican Sens. Justine Wadsack and
Anthony
Kern stood and turned their backs to the
governor. Earlier, GOP Reps. Rachel Jones,
Alexander Kolodin and
Jacqueline Parker
walked out of the speech. Midway through the
speech, Rep. Jake Hoffman exited the House
floor. “It’s unfortunate that some members
chose an immature stunt instead, but we have
really tough issues in front of us and we
need to work together to stop them,” Hobbs
said during a news conference after the
speech.
Elected
officials
and
candidates
for
office
in 2022
continue
to
challenge
and
question
the
results
of the
2020
presidential
election
in
Arizona.
The
results
have
been
examined
and
re-examined,
challenged
in court
and in a
monthslong
ballot
review.
No
evidence
has been
found of
widespread
fraud or
error in
the
results.
Yet
candidates
deny the
outcome.
Others
don't
quite go
as far.
But they
raise
questions
about
potential
irregularities
they say
could
have
influenced
the vote
and
should
be
examined.
The
Arizona
Republic
is
listing
candidates
by
category
by the
race
that
they are
entered
in. This
list is
not
complete
and will
be
updated
throughout
the 2022
election
season.
Election
deniers
These
candidates
in
Arizona
races
deny
that Joe
Biden
won the
2020
presidential
election,
either
in
Arizona
or
nationwide.
Question 2: Adding “sexual orientation,” “gender identity,” or “gender expression” to the protected classes of race, religion, age, sex, and ancestry in nondiscrimination law.
Candidates'
Position:
Oppose.
Question 4: Allowing biological males that identify as transgender to play on female sports’ teams.
Candidates'
Position: Oppose
Question 8: Allowing parents to seek professional counseling for their minor child with same-sex attraction or gender identity issues.*
Candidates'
Position: Support
Question 9:
Protecting individuals and
businesses from being required
to provide services or use their
artistic expression in a manner
that violates their moral or
religious beliefs.**
Candidates' Position:
Support.
*
This is in reference to the
dangerous and disproven
"Reparative Therapy".
Lawmakers on Capitol
Hill are continuing to press Thomas to
testify about her role in pressuring
lawmakers to overturn the results of the
election which included emails from the FreeRoots platform. Queen Creek Republican
Jake Hoffman, who sent a letter to Vice
President Mike Pence asking him on January 5
to not accept the election results and was
one of Arizona’s fake Trump electors, now
seems to operate a website built on FreeRoots and has connections to the old
platform’s owner.
The Fountain Hills
Republican said he supports this alternative
to increase the number of Maricopa County
supervisors from five to nine. The stalled
bill was introduced by GOP State
Representative Jake Hoffman, whose district
includes southern Gilbert and parts of Pinal
County.
He also was one of 11 Republicans
who falsely declared himself an elector for
the defeated former president
Donald Trump
in 2020. Hoffman’s bill would have created
four separate boards of supervisors in a
former Maricopa County. The bill analysis
estimated that it would increase costs by at
least $155.2 million each year for new
county officials and staff. These new
supervisors, according to Democratic
Representative Lorenzo Sierra of Tolleson,
would have likely skewed Republican. “When
you did an assessment of the political
breakdown of the four [proposed] counties,
you saw it was gerrymandered significantly,”
he said. At present, four of the county's
five supervisors are Republicans. The Board,
through a spokesperson, declined comment. HB
2787 has been branded by Democrats, some
Republicans, and many in the media as a
thinly veiled punishment for Maricopa
County’s Board of Supervisors, which
certified the 2020 Presidential Election in
favor of Joe Biden and resisted efforts by
state GOP lawmakers to force a
now-discredited audit of the results. The
stalled bill would dilute the power of
current supervisors. “At the time, I thought
it was just a way of being able to have more
folks that would overturn or decertify or do
something funky with the elections,” Sierra
added. The new counties with boundaries and
populations proposed. [...] Hoffman refutes
any accusation his bill is about anything
other than representation. While presenting
HB 2787 to the committee on February 16, he
said, “This bill is not designed as any type
of retribution for the county. It is
explicitly not an election issue.”
With an actual
straight face, Rep.
Jake Hoffman said
his bill – which
would strip the
Maricopa County
Board of Supervisors
of their power – has
absolutely nothing
to do with the fact
that the supervisors
refused to decertify
the 2020 election.
Or that the
supervisors poked
gaping holes in
every conspiracy
theory offered up by
the Senate’s ninja
auditors.
Any attempt to paint
this as retaliation
or retribution
toward the county is
pure conspiracy
theory ... ,”
Hoffman, R-Queen
Creek, told the
House Government and
Elections Committee
during Wednesday’s
hearing on his bill.
“To say that this
has anything to do
with the election is
laughable and
nothing more than a
conspiracy theory.
[ . . . ]
And to suggest that
we should take
anything Jake
Hoffman says at face
value is, as laughs
goes, a belly
buster.
Hoffman is the guy
who ran an internet
troll farm in the
months leading up to
the 2020 election,
hiring teenagers to
blanket the internet
with fake posts on
conservative talking
points and baseless
conspiracy theories
aimed at getting
Donald Trump
reelected.
He is one of the
state’s now-infamous
fake electors,
avowing in December
2020 that he had
been duly elected by
Arizona voters to
cast one of
Arizona’s 11
electoral votes for
Trump.
He’s the guy who on
Jan. 5, 2021, sent
an email to a White
House staffer,
containing an
“urgent letter” to
be passed along to
then-Vice President
Mike Pence. The
email, obtained by
MSNBC’s Rachel
Maddow, implored
Pence to “delay the
certification of the
election results and
instead seek
clarification from
the Arizona
legislature as to
which slate of
Presidential
Electors are proper
and accurate.” . .
The day before
rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol, an Arizona
lawmaker, who had signed a document falsely
asserting he was one of the state’s
presidential electors, sent a letter to Vice
President Mike Pence asking him to not
accept the state’s official electoral votes.
The two-page letter sent by Rep. Jake
Hoffman on Jan. 5, 2020, had the same aim as
the rioters would the next day: delaying the
official certification of
Donald Trump’s
loss in the 2020 election and the victory of
President Joe Biden. Hoffman’s letter asked
Pence to order that Arizona’s electors not
be decided by the popular vote of the
citizens, but instead by the members of the
state Legislature. Hoffman, in the letter,
asked Pence to “seek clarification from the
Arizona legislature as to which slate of
electors were proper and accurate.”
Feb. 16, 2022
Fake Elector Struggles To Explain Role In Scheme To Submit False Election Papers
Rachel Maddow
shares video shot by
a KPNX
photojournalist of
Arizona Republic
reporter Richard
Ruelas asking
Arizona State
Representative Jake
Hoffman how he came
to represent himself
as an elector on
paperwork that
falsely claimed
Donald Trump had won
Arizona in 2020.
Several prominent
Arizona Republicans
issued a joint
letter Wednesday
afternoon asking
Gov.
Doug Ducey to
withhold funding and
begin legal action
against school
districts that are
not following state
laws.
A digital
marketing firm closely linked to the
pro-Trump youth group Turning Point USA
was responsible for a series of
deceptive Facebook ads promoting Green
party candidates during the 2018 US
midterm elections in an apparent attempt
to split the Democratic vote in a number
of close races. The ads purported to
come from an organization called America
Progress Now (APN) and used socialist
memes and rhetoric to urge leftwing
voters to support Green party
candidates.
Facebook was
aware of the true identity of the
advertiser and the deceptive nature of
the ads, but the company determined that
it did not violate its policies. The
conservative marketing firm called
itself “Rally Forge”, and went on to set
up a pro-Trump domestic “troll farm” for
Turning Point Action, a “sister”
organization of Turning Point USA, in
2020, earning a permanent ban from
Facebook. Turning Point is led by
right-wing stooge Charlie Kirk, a
favorite target of Twitter’s for his
many gaffes as he continues to support
Trump.
A right-wing
political marketing firm that ran a
$350,000 pro-Trump Super Pac in the 2016
election, Rally Forge was founded and
run by Jake Hoffman, an Arizona
Republican who was at the time a member
of the town council in Queen Creek,
Arizona. In November 2020 Hoffman was
elected to serve in the Arizona state
legislature.
Hoffman signed
on to a letter to
Congress asking
lawmakers to accept
11 “alternate”
electoral votes for
Trump or to have all
of the state’s
electoral votes
“nullified
completely until a
full forensic audit
can be conducted.”
Deceptive political campaigns
were enough for Facebook to ban newly elected
Arizona State Representative Jake Hoffman's digital
marketing firm from its service and for Twitter to
permanently suspend his personal account.
You might remember Jake
Hoffman for his pearly smile, or for the time his
digital marketing company Rally Forge formed a
Russian-style disinformation cell of local teens in
an attempt to undermine election results in support
of President
Donald Trump. Hoffman's hijinks don't
stop there. A Stanford report found that the Queen
Creek councilmember's company had established dozens
of fake social media accounts in support of
conservative political causes.
Revelations about
right-wing
disinformation boss
Jake Hoffman's
election ratfuckery
have spurred a
last-ditch effort to
stop him from
ascending to the
Arizona
legislature.
In response to the Post's
reporting, Twitter suspended 20 accounts for
violating the site's terms of service and Facebook
cracked down on an additional number. The paper
found nearly 4,500 identical posts associated with
the effort, which it believes is just a small
fraction of the total output. The field director for
Turning Point Action, the Turning Point USA entity
directly managing the effort" [...] "Hoffman
defended the identical spam messages that were often
posted in the comments of news articles as similar
to a phone-bank script.
Question 2:
Adding “sexual orientation,”
“gender identity,” or “gender
expression” to the protected
classes of race, religion, age,
sex, and ancestry in
nondiscrimination law.
Candidates'
Position:
Oppose.
Question 4:
Allowing biological males that
identify as transgender to play
on female sports’ teams.
Candidates'
Position: Oppose
Question 9:
Protecting a parent's right to
seek professional counseling for
their minor child with same-sex
attraction or gender identity
issues to help them reach their
desired outcome.*
Candidates'
Position: Support
Question 11:
Protecting individuals and
businesses from being required
to provide services or use their
artistic expression in a manner
that violates their moral or
religious beliefs.**
Candidates' Position:
Support.
*
This is in reference to the
dangerous and disproven
"Reparative Therapy".
