Posts Tagged ‘Republican scandal’

At some point there will be no Republicans left to scandalize – at least if the current track record is any indication – because people will get so fed up, they’ll look elsewhere for a political home.

The latest scandal, broken by Greg Patterson at espressopundit and picked up by Dennis Welch at the Arizona Guardian,  is in Arizona, where the founder of a social political club, Politics on the Rocks, showed up on the client list of a call-girl ring.  Charles Jensen has said it’s “100 percent false” and he’s hired an attorney to defend him and his name.

The good news is that two of the advisory board members, radio personality Mike Broomhead and Paradise Valley Mayor and potential gubernatorial candidate, Vernon Parker, have resigned the Politics on the Rocks board out of protest. *UPDATE – It appears that John Munger has resigned as well.

I’ve never been to any of the Politics on the Rocks events, but I’ve heard they generate big crowds of young professionals.  It’s sad that this scandal will taint these young people’s view of politics.

Escort client list shakes up political community

Sunday, 27 September 2009 21:45 Dennis Welch

By Dennis Welch
The Arizona Guardian

At least two prominent Republicans quit an influential GOP organization this weekend because its leader has been linked to one of the state’s biggest prostitution stings.

Charles Jensen, founder of Politics on the Rocks, was one of several thousand names on a list of clients of the Desert Divas, a high-end escort service busted last year by Phoenix police.

Although Jensen denies any involvement with the prostitution ring, Paradise Valley Mayor Vernon Parker and conservative talk-radio personality Mike Broomhead have resigned from the political group’s advisory board. Parker last week announced his intentions to explore a run for governor at a meeting of the group at a Paradise Valley resort.

Phoenix police released the list of clients’ names last year but without any addresses or other information. A more detailed list was made public last week after Greg Patterson, who writes the political blog Espresso Pundit, obtained it through a public records request. He published the list on hs Web site last last week and the political community has been buzzing ever since.

Parker told the Guardian on Sunday that he is stepping down from the advisory board until the matter is cleared up. He said he had no idea Jensen’s name was on Desert Divas’ list when he joined the group.

Jensen “and I spoke on the phone last night and came to the conclusion that it would be best for the organization that I resign until this gets resolved,” Parker said.

Jensen created the national organization –- which has seven chapters through the country — as a way for conservative Republicans to meet and network in a social setting. Most of the gatherings for the local chapter take place at a posh resort in Paradise Valley. The political social-club’s logo is an elephant holding a martini glass.

Besides Parker, other high-profile Republican leaders have appeared at the group’s gatherings. Arizona Sen. John McCain recently was the keynote speaker. And state Treasurer Dean Martin, who also is eying a run for the governor’s office, is scheduled to speak next month.

Jensen, who said he didn’t even know his name was on the list until last week, adamantly denies he used the escort service. He says he has hired an attorney to “go after” anyone who accuses him of doing so.

Jensen’s name and home address appear on list of alleged clients, according to police records.

The documents show that escorts from Desert Divas visited his home three times between July and December 2007.

“I’ve hired an attorney to fight anyone who insinuates I had anything to do with this,” Jensen said Sunday. “This is 100 percent false.”

Jensen said he’s got airline tickets and hotel receipts showing he was out of town each time the records show the escorts were going to his north Scottsdale home. But Jensen said he needs to confer with his attorney before making his own records publicly available.

Jensen said he suspects someone staying at his home during that time period may have called for escorts. But he declined to identify that person or their relationship to him.

He has never been contacted by police about the Desert Divas, Jensen said.

Jensen also confirmed that Broomhead, who hosts the Republican-friendly Mike Broomhead Show on KFYI 550 AM, has also stepped down from the board, at least for now. Broomhead was unavailable for comment on Sunday.

“I feel really sorry for him. It’s too bad,” Jensen said. “He hadn’t even been to an advisory board meeting.”

Members of the advisory board meet once a year and don’t have a large role in the organization, Jensen said.

Having well known GOP leaders affiliated with the club helps with promotion and establishes it as a legitimate group, he said.

While Parker and Broomhead are the only two who have officially stepped down from the 12-member board, others are considering whether they will continue working with Jensen’s group.

Sen. Jonathan Paton, a Republican from Tucson, says he’s undecided whether he’s going to stay on the board or not.

“I’ll have talk to Charles first,” Paton told the Guardian on Sunday. “I haven’t done anything with them yet.”

Paton said he joined this year after Jensen called him and asked if he could help with events in the southern part of the state.

The Desert Divas case began in 2007 when police got a tip about the prostitution ring. They made a first round of arrests in August 2008. Since then, more than 50 people have been arrestd in what authorities have called the largest prostitution bust in Arizona history.

A less detailed list of Desert Divas’ clients was released last year, but that document did not include addresses or other personal identifying information. The latest document released by Phoenix police does.

Authorities have discovered that some of the names on the list were made up. Police have not been concentrating on the clients of Desert Divas, saying those on the list are not suspects.