The strange backstory of the Stolen Valor Act, which just passed through the Arizona Legislature

The Arizona Legislature passed a bill Tuesday which increases penalties for people who impersonate veterans to get benefits.

The “Stolen Valor Act” was sponsored by Rep. Walt Blackman (R-Snowflake), who is a veteran himself.

Stolen valor is already illegal at the federal level, but the bill puts more teeth in state law. It would make impersonating a veteran to get a benefit a misdemeanor, unless the benefit exceeds a certain amount of money in which case it would be a Class 5 felony.

The bill had near unanimous support in the Legislature, but it nearly failed due to the efforts of Sen. Wendy Rogers (R-Flagstaff) who held it from a vote in her committee.

In last year’s primary election, Blackman competed against a fellow Republican, Steve Slaton, who embellished his service record. Slaton, ran alongside Rogers. Blackman said Slaton’s relationship to Rogers and Sen. Mark Finchem (R-Prescott) was the reason his bill got pushback in the Senate.

“I believe that Sen. Rogers and Sen. Finchem have some sort of benefit in protecting this individual. I don't know why,” Blackman said in March.

Blackman circumvented Rogers, who is also a veteran, with the support of Sen. Shawnna Bolick (R-Phoenix) and got the bill to the full Senate this week where it passed 29-1.

The bill had previously passed out of the House of Representatives 54-1.

The only “no” votes in each chamber were Sen. Jake Hoffman (R-Queen Creek) and Rep. Alexander Kolodin (R-Scottsdale).

Despite frequent criticism from Blackman, who said Rogers wouldn’t communicate with him about the bill, Rogers took credit for negotiations after the measure passed and ended up supporting it on the floor.

Rogers put out a press release, not mentioning Blackman, claiming she “facilitated improvements” to the bill.

"I'm honored to have facilitated meaningful changes on an earlier version of the stolen valor bill, so that this legislation can now better provide a practical solution for holding bad actors accountable. The compromises made by the bill sponsor helped get this legislation across the finish line. The final product of SB 1424 reflects a team effort to ensure military imposters are held accountable. … I will continue to proudly advocate for our veterans in any way that I can," Rogers said in the statement.

On social media, veterans responded with skepticism to Rogers’ new support of the bill.

Blackman credited the veteran community for putting pressure on the Senate to get the bill to a vote.

“I am extremely thankful for everyone who stood with me to get this legislation across the finish line — veteran advocates, legislative colleagues, community leaders, and every constituent who spoke up and demanded action,” Blackman said. “This victory belongs to every service member and military family of those who has earned their place with honor.”

Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs indicated she’ll sign the bill into law.

The governor said on Tuesday that stolen valor is “absolutely unacceptable.”

“I’m proud to be governor of a state that’s home to hundreds of thousands of veterans and their families, and we should do everything we can to honor their service and provide them with the support they need and make sure that stolen valor issues don't happen,” Hobbs said.

Hear more from Camryn Sanchez on The Show with host Sam Dingman

Listen • 7:06

Full conversation

SAM DINGMAN: Senate Bill 1424, the so-called Stolen Valor Act, is headed to Gov. Hobbs's desk. If she signs it, the legislation will make it a crime to lie about having served in the military in order to get a job or other potential benefits. The backstory of this legislation is full of twists and turns, and here to tell us about them is KJZZ's Camryn Sanchez. Good morning, Camryn.

CAMRYN SANCHEZ: Good morning.

DINGMAN: So, let's start at the beginning. Tell us what Senate Bill 1424 says.

SANCHEZ: Right, so I think that was a pretty good summary. It basically says you cannot impersonate a veteran, and if you are a veteran, you cannot embellish your service record. So that is something that's already what you're not supposed to do at the federal level, but this puts some more teeth on it. It's putting it into state law in such a way that says, “Hey, if you're doing this and you get some sort of tangible benefit from it, then that's actually a misdemeanor, and if you get a certain kind of benefit that's worth a lot, then it's actually a felony.” And so that's much stronger, and it's basically trying to send a message.

DINGMAN: OK, well, let's talk about the origin story of how this bill came to be. There are some interesting central characters in this drama. The bill is the brainchild of Rep. Walt Blackman, correct?

SANCHEZ: Correct.

DINGMAN: Tell us about Walt.

SANCHEZ: So Blackman is a representative from Snowflake area, that's District 7. We have 30 legislative districts. He's in that one. He himself is a longtime veteran, and in the primary election, he ran against this guy called Steve Slaton. So Slaton is a fellow Republican and is accused of stolen valor, this exact issue, right? So, Blackman succeeded. He beat Slaton. He's in the Legislature now. Fast forward, he introduces this bill. It seems to those of us who are familiar with that race to be very pointed, of course. Now, what's really interesting is that Sen. Wendy Rogers, who is also from Legislative District 7, is a fan of Steve Slaton's. OK, so in the primary, she really backed him, she was very supportive of him, they've had like events together, they're pretty well known to be very connected. And his bill was originally assigned to her committee, which is the Judiciary Committee, where it basically died for all intents and purposes because she wouldn't give it a hearing initially in the Senate. So they had to do some circumnavigating and get it away from her and basically through legislative whatever, put it on to a different piece of legislation to get it out of the House and back into the Senate while avoiding her.

DINGMAN: OK, so let's back up a little bit and talk about the nest of connections between Wendy Rogers and Steve Slaton. He's the owner of a Trump memorabilia store.

SANCHEZ: It's called the Trumped Store.

DINGMAN: OK. and during the primary campaign, he made claims to military service, and there was no evidence of those claims.

SANCHEZ: Well, this was checked. I believe it was the White Mountain Independent who broke the story, or maybe the Mountain Daily. Anyway, basically he had a record, but he embellished it, and those records are available and they were looked up and it didn't match with what he had said. And veterans were very frustrated by that because, understandably, veterans don't appreciate it. People who are not veterans say that they are, that they've done all this great stuff, and they have these awards and things, and they really don't. So it became a big issue in that primary race, and the fact that Roger stood by him was also notable to the community because she's been their senator for quite a while now.

DINGMAN: Yes, and if I'm not mistaken, Slaton was also paying Rogers' nephew $1,000 a month as a campaign strategist.

SANCHEZ: Well, Rogers' nephew, Spencer Rogers, has this consulting company called Go Right Strategies, and yes, that is part of the relationship there.

DINGMAN: OK. So, fast forward back to the almost present moment, Blackman's bill goes to Roger's committee and sort of disappears, right?

SANCHEZ: Right. So everyone's waiting for it to go up on the board to get to a vote, and then it just never does, because she's holding it back.

DINGMAN: And at one point, am I correct that Black or Rogers claimed that she had reached out to Blackman to talk about it, but then Blackmon said, "I never heard from her."

SANCHEZ: Yeah, Blackman has been very vocal throughout this whole process and had press conferences and things with other lawmakers and veterans standing behind him saying, “This is ridiculous.” And Sen. Rogers basically accusing her of not wanting to work with them, and Sen. Bullock, who allowed Blackman to get the bill away from her committee, basically said the same thing.

DINGMAN: So now, as you mentioned earlier, this strange deadlock has somehow broken. How did that happen?

SANCHEZ: Well, it depends on who you ask. So when the bill passed yesterday, it passed out of the state Senate. Now it goes to the governor's desk, as I think you mentioned, and Rogers put out this press release saying, basically, “You're welcome,” and taking credit for negotiating on the bill and getting it amended. And saying that she's honored to vote for it, and she did support it on the floor, much to some like the confusion of everyone else who's been watching this play out over the past, however many months. And said, “Wait, I thought that you and Blackman were locked against each other over this issue. Why are you taking credit for the bill?” And her press release, by the way, did not mention him at all,

DINGMAN: Did not mention Blackman?

SANCHEZ: No, it did not. He didn't say too much about it, but I think he did call her disingenuous. That is what the veterans are saying as well. I think there's an implication that she was really pressured to put it up for a vote because of them, and probably threats were made about her next reelection campaign, and do you really want to be known as the person who fought the Stolen Valor Act, who is not on the side of the veterans? Even though Rogers herself is a veteran.

DINGMAN: Oh.

SANCHEZ: Yeah, she is. And it passed almost unanimously in both the House and Senate. I think only one person voted against it in each chamber.

DINGMAN: Well, we've just about a minute left here, Camryn, and I'm curious to get your take. Last week on The Show, we talked with your colleague Wayne Schutsky about some of the infighting that's been happening amongst Republicans this session, and it seems like we're seeing more of that here with regard to this bill. What do you make of that?

SANCHEZ: Well, yeah, it's definitely a trend. I don't even want to say it's a recent trend. It's something that has always been there, at least in my time at the Legislature, right? This one was a pretty public fight. I think often they like to present a more united front, and this was pretty messy. And I think it bleeds into the next election because we have these legislative elections every two years. Blackman and Rogers being in the same district, there's a chance that they might try to put up candidates against one another, something like that. Obviously the Republican majority needs to work together, so it's awkward to say the least, and I think it's typically something that they try to prevent from being so public.

DINGMAN: All right, well, that is KJZZ's Camryn Sanchez. Thank you very much, Camryn.

SANCHEZ: Thank you.

EDITOR'S NOTE: This story has been updated to correct that the act would make impersonating a veteran to get a benefit a misdemeanor.