Now that bigotry and racism is house-sitting 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., it seems fitting that ex-Maricopa County, Ariz., Sheriff Joe Arpaio—who was so vile and xenophobic that the courts ordered him to stop targeting Latinos in Arizona, but he refused and was sent to prison until the xenophobe in chief pardoned him—may be running for Congress.
That’s right—ol’ bitter-ass, hate-filled Arpaio is reportedly considering running for Arizona’s open Senate seat, and not the one that Rep. Trent Franks vacated after either having conversations with staffers about surrogacy or asking them to be actual surrogates; it’s all too confusing.
“I am seriously, seriously, seriously considering running for the U.S. Senate,” Arpaio told the Daily Beast. “Not the congressman’s seat.”
According to Roll Call, this isn’t the first time the deplorable former sheriff has considered running for office:
“Arpaio previously flirted with staging a primary challenge to Republican Sen. Jeff Flake before Flake announced he would not seek re-election after one term.
“Before that, he said he was considering a run for the Senate in 2011 when Sen. Jon Kyl announced his retirement. He led in some polls before deciding against running,” Roll Call reports.
The website also notes that Austin Flake, Flake’s son, has a lawsuit against Arpaio for malicious prosecution after Austin was targeted in the deaths of 21 dogs at a kennel where he and his then-wife worked.
Austin Flake claims that he was targeted because Arpaio wanted his father’s seat.
Arpaio became a darling of the far right for his racist practices as the Arizona sheriff who unlawfully targeted and arrested Latinos without probable cause. It also didn’t hurt matters that the disgraced sheriff supported racist Birther claims that President Barack Obama wasn’t an American, fanned by then-private citizen Donald Trump.
Read more at the Daily Beast and Roll Call.