Pima Dems Announce "Al Melvin Week," Highlight Reckless Record

With the Arizona Legislature utterly repudiated after the May 18 special election, the Pima County Democratic Party is kicking off the 2010 election cycle by celebrating "Al Melvin Week."

Lawmakers for two years have slashed and burned through already-dead-last public schools' budgets, while refusing to close sales tax loopholes for spa treatments and country club memberships.

Melvin has promised to serve the interests of Phoenix political bosses to impose the Republican Party platform on his voters, even though 60 percent of his constituents reject the label "Republican."

Pima County Democrats will illustrate his five most outrageous votes that he will have to defend in November.

Number Five: Voting against the Lopez Amendment, requiring Arizona schools teach the Holocaust. Melvin found it important enough to micromanage school curricula by banning ethnic studies programs but he voted to make teaching that the Nazis killed 6 million Jews optional.

"In a vacuum, this is just an impossible vote to defend," said Pima County Democratic Party Chair Jeff Rogers. "However, Al Melvin has shown a pattern of behavior that is wildly out-of-touch with his voters, from Flowing Wells to the Foothills and from the Northwest Side to Catalina."

Melvin has led the purge of reasonable Republicans from the party and now stakes a claim to the fringe. Yet not even that kind of extremism explains this vote.

"I'm not exactly sure how voting against teaching the Holocaust advances his assault on moderates but he must have some sort of plan we don't know about," Rogers said.

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