Tucson Republican Reps. Cory McGarr and Rachel Jones. Photos by Gage Skidmore || Flickr/CC BY-SA 2.0
JAMES O’ROURKE
Arizona Mirror
Last month, Democrats and Republicans overrode the objections of the hyper-conservative Arizona Freedom Caucus to pass a bill allowing Maricopa County voters to decide whether to extend a local transportation sales tax next year.
The far-right members of the Freedom Caucus have publicly fought with the Republicans who backed the transportation tax vote legislation, saying the plan wastes tax money by funding public transit — particularly Maricopa County’s light rail system.
But some have gone beyond traditional conservative opposition to taxes and government spending and say the transportation plan is actually part of a covert plot to implement totalitarian control over Arizona.
Climate conspiracy fearmongering
In the immediate wake of the legislature passing the bill to extend Proposition 400, several Freedom Caucus critics of the measure linked it to conspiracy theories that claim urban development and transit projects are really nefarious attempts by the government to trap people in ghettos so they can be controlled more easily.
That, they claim, is done by creating so-called “15-minute cities,” in which urban areas are developed so that all necessities are available within a 15-minute walk. The primary benefit would be reducing the average person’s reliance on automobiles, leading to an overall decrease in carbon emissions, which are a lead cause of climate change.
To bad-faith critics and conspiracy theorists, it’s actually meant to block citizens from moving out of small areas.
“What this is, is an attempt by … the climate alarmists to go out there and actually have a way of making travel more difficult,” Rep. Cory McGarr, R-Tucson, said in a July 31 interview on KNST in Tucson. “So, they say the 15-minute city, well, you don’t get there overnight, but what you do is you condense down the road — it’s called a road diet… You’re making a four lane road down to two, and then you’re adding, like, a bike lane, because everybody I know bikes to work, except for nobody I know bikes to work.”
