Kelly Townsend is usually a pretty reliable conservative vote and one who will stick to her principles and show respect to her fellow colleagues and constituents no matter what.
Until recently.
Townsend, feeling heat for turning on her fellow conservatives f
or helping to pass KidsCare out of the Arizona House of Representatives at the end of this last Arizona legislative session, has attempted to unload blame and misdirection to an easy target - Andy Biggs, running in one of the most competitive primaries across Arizona for Arizona's Fifth Congressional District to replace retiring Congressman Matt Salmon.
(If you remember,
Andy Biggs stood courageously against the passage of this program during the last legislative session.)
Townsend has become unleashed and unhinged -
mainly on her Twitter account - as she rants and rails against Andy Biggs on an almost daily basis. Townsend is also a known Justin Olson supporter.
One of the most bizarre series of tweets, though, came when Townsend took her beef to an LD 16 constituent Deborah Geesling. Geesling is a warrior and advocate for the mentally ill, going to great and exhaustive lengths to lobby both at a state and a federal level for the protection and safe keeping of those who cannot as easily help themselves.
Mrs. Geesling rightly called out Representative Townsend for her outright slanderous statements directed towards Andy Biggs on social media. A Twitter debate broke out, where Townsend burst out with a tweet that she would later come to regret very much (the tweet appears to have been deleted by Townsend):
Mrs. Geesling has all the right in the world to express shock and dismay over what transpired on Twitter. It is reprehensible and utterly classless for a legislator of any body or jurisdiction to knowingly turn his or her political barbs and irrational anger to a constituent in a public forum - in the way that Representative Townsend did on Twitter on July 21st.
July 21st showed the people of LD 16 that Representative Kelly Townsend has forgotten to whom she answers to and serves. She apparently has been in the legislature too long and becoming too content with establishment legislators who serve only themselves and their interests.
Kelly Townsend should, at the very least, apologize for lashing out in anger to her constituent Deborah Geesling. Perhaps a beer summit should be proposed and accepted by both parties to mend fences?
(More to come on the Kelly Townsend fiascos.)