Arizona Capitol Times
An investigation into who sent racist text messages to state Rep. Walter Blackman, R-Snowflake, and his daughter, has been reopened by the Arizona Department of Public Safety, DPS spokesman Bart Graves.
The Arizona Department of Public Safety had closed the investigation into who sent the racist text messages.
On January 28, someone sent text messages to Rep. Walter Blackman, R-Snowflake, and his daughter calling Blackman a “Rino” – a term meaning “Republican in name only” – and a racial slur, according to a DPS incident report. The texts kicked off a dispute between Blackman and Jordan Conradson, a blogger for the rightwing Gateway Pundit website, after Blackman’s wife accused Conradson of sending the messages.
The day before, Conradson wrote a post criticizing Blackman for saying there is “nothing in the Constitution that says that we can decertify” the 2020 election, even though he wished that there were. Blackman and his wife contacted Conradson and asked him to remove the post, according to the police report.
After Blackman and his daughter received the texts, Blackman’s wife Kristie Blackman took to Facebook and accused Conradson of sending the texts, according to the police report. She deleted the post after about 30 minutes, but Conradson posted screenshots online.
After that, the family received an onslaught of harassing phone calls, Kristie Blackman said.
