February 7, 2021

Report: The Trump Campaign Paid an Arizona Lawmaker Amid Efforts to Overturn State Election Results

The payment was disclosed in campaign’s latest financial disclosure.

Mark Finchem (left) at the Arizona State Capitol in Phoenix, Arizona.Gage Skidmore/Johnny Louis/Wikimedia Commons/AP

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

A Republican member of the Arizona state legislature took more than $6,000 from the Trump campaign in December, as he was pushing fellow state lawmakers to overturn the November election results, the Arizona Republic reported Saturday.

The payment to state Rep. Mark Finchem was disclosed in the Trump campaign’s latest financial disclosure, which listed the money as being paid on Dec. 18, 2020 in exchange for “recount: legal consulting.”

Finchem claims the payment was a reimbursement for “crowd control and security costs” for a meeting held at a downtown Phoenix hotel Nov. 30 with the former president’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, the paper said.

The payment was made to a company registered to the lawmaker’s house. Records on file with the state show the firm was formed in 2008 to provide “Real Estate Sales & Management,” but it’s not clear what it is currently doing, if anything. The Republic noted that the company was not listed in the legislator’s most recent disclosures, as required, and that Finchem did not answer questions about the omission. The paper also reported that Finchem is, in fact, not a lawyer, but is enrolled at the University of Arizona’s James E. Rogers College of Law.

Finchem was at the US Capitol on January 6 after former President Donald Trump whipped up a crowd of his supporters that went on to storm the Capitol in hopes of preventing President Joe Biden’s electoral victory from being certified. Finchem said he did not enter the building as part of the protests, which left half a dozen people dead and led to Trump’s second impeachment in the days before he left office.

Previously, Finchem has claimed to be part of the Oath Keepers, a right-wing extremist militia that was also present at the Capitol on January 6. In 2014 he sought to recruit new members to the group, according to a Facebook screenshot, and also claimed to be a member of the group in 2014 ahead of that year’s elections.

Accountable.Us, a Washington, D.C.-based progressive advocacy group, told the Republic in a statement that the payment should be explained to understand “how it influenced his official work as a legislator to try and overturn a free and fair election.”

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate