{"id":702,"date":"2007-11-02T20:46:00","date_gmt":"2007-11-02T20:46:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.arkansasfreedom.net\/?p=702"},"modified":"2007-11-02T20:46:00","modified_gmt":"2007-11-02T20:46:00","slug":"free-transport-huckabee-and-family-p-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arkansasfreedom.net\/?p=702","title":{"rendered":"Free Transport: Huckabee and family (p. 2)"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

“Any time we’re
\nspending taxpayers’ dollars in government, we should pay attention to
\nthat,” Republican state Sen. <\/span>Bill Earley told the Argus Leader. Another Republican
\nstate senator, Bill Napoli, was quoted in the paper supporting <\/span>the Democrats’ letter to the FAA.<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

Arkansas
\nstate Sen. Gilbert Baker, who is also the chairman of the state Republican
\nParty, said he was not familiar with <\/span>the
\nsituation in South Dakota.<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

“The
\nbottom line for me is that obviously we have a governor who has an important
\nrole nationally with the National <\/span>Governors Association and it is good for Arkansas that
\nhe is in that role,” Baker said. “I don’t know the details <\/span>regarding the policies on the use
\nof the State Police plane, but I am confident he is using it
\nappropriately.”<\/span><\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

When
\nasked if Huckabee should be more transparent about how and why he decides to
\nutilize the plane, Baker said, <\/span>“We do live in a new day when it comes to security issues…. If it
\nis a security issue, there is no way I would want to <\/span>tread on mat. I would just have to trust the State
\nPolice in that regard.”<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

A
\ndetermination of whether Huckabee’s use of the State Police aircraft is lawful
\nwould likely be conducted by the non\u00c2\u00ad<\/span>partisan Division of Legislative Audit To start that
\nprocess, a member of the Legislative Joint Auditing Committee <\/span>must request a fact-finding report<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

State
\nRep. Tommy Roebuck, who co-chairs the committee with state Sen. Hank Wilkins,
\nsaid that no one on the <\/span>committee has
\nraised questions about Huckabee’s use of the state-owned plane.<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

No accountability<\/span><\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

A security catch shrouds state plane use.<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

Warwick
\nSabin <\/span><\/u>Updated:
\n12\/22\/2005<\/span><\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

Gov. Mike Huckabee
\nwill not discuss with the Arkansas Times his use of a state-owned airplane for
\nout-of-state travel that has little or no connection with his official duties.
\nHe cites security considerations in his refusal to justify personal <\/span>use of taxpayer equipment and State Police employees.<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

For
\nexample, Huckabee and three members of his family used the state-owned airplane
\nin October to fly to and from Washington, D.C., so he and his wife, Janet,
\ncould participate in the Marine Corps marathon. Why did security <\/span>considerations deem necessary the
\nuse of the plane (rather than a commercial airliner) for Huckabee’s travel to a
\nplace <\/span>where he and
\nhis wife would run and walk 26.2 miles through the streets of a city with a
\nhigh crime rate? The <\/span>explanation, too, is
\nprotected by “security.” Or so the governor’s staff says.<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

Left
\nto guess why Huckabee feels confident mat he is acting within the law, the
\nTimes found an advisory opinion issued Oct 16,1997, by the Arkansas Ethics
\nCommission in response to a question from Bud Cummins, who was Huckabee’s chief
\nlegal counsel at the time. Cummins asked, “Whether [Arkansas Code]
\nrequiring the Arkansas State Police (ASP) to provide security for the governor
\nauthorizes the use of state-owned vehicles or airplanes to transport <\/span>the governor to and from any
\ndestination for any purpose when the ASP determines that use of such a
\nconveyance will <\/span>optimize security for the
\ngovernor?”<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

The commission’s “brief
\nresponse” was, “Yes. There are no statutory restrictions on the use
\nof state-owned airplanes. Ark. Code Ann. <\/span>\u00c2\u00a7 19-4-2103
\nspecifically permits the use of state-owned vehicles for personal or
\nnon-official business <\/span>by state constitutional officers.”<\/span><\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

Subsection
\n19-4-2103 was passed into law in 1991 <\/span>\u00e2\u20ac\u201d before the
\nState Police owned an airplane \u00e2\u20ac\u201d and has not been <\/span>amended
\nsince. Its full text is:<\/span><\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Any time we’re spending taxpayers’ dollars in government, we should pay attention to that,” Republican state Sen. Bill Earley told the Argus Leader. Another Republican state senator, Bill Napoli, was quoted in the paper supporting the Democrats’ letter to the FAA. Arkansas state Sen. Gilbert Baker, who is also the chairman of the state Republican … Continue reading Free Transport: Huckabee and family (p. 2)<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-702","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-huckabee-shameful-record","category-state-government-offenses"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arkansasfreedom.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arkansasfreedom.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arkansasfreedom.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arkansasfreedom.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arkansasfreedom.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=702"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arkansasfreedom.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arkansasfreedom.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arkansasfreedom.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arkansasfreedom.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}