busted

Was Sarah Huckabee Sanders just caught in a Super Bowl-sized grift?

Sarah Huckabee Sanders

Taylor Swift wasn’t the only high-profile Kansas City Chiefs fan to receive VIP treatment at the Super Bowl earlier this month.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders was there, too!

The Arkansas governor and her family enjoyed a lavish trip to Las Vegas for Super Bowl LVIII, complete with on-field access and admission to the Chiefs’ victory party. We know this because Sanders plastered the pictures all over Instagram.

While the affair looked like a wonderful time, there is one burning question.

Who paid?!?

With an average ticket price of $8,600, attending the Super Bowl wasn’t cheap. And from the looks of it, Sanders and her clan didn’t just enjoy an average experience. They were true VIPs, snapping pictures on the field before the game and celebrating with the winners afterwards.

It’s fair to say Sanders’ package cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not more. She enjoyed the game from a luxury suite, reports Talking Points Memo. And suites started at $180,000 for four tickets, according to DAZN.

And we haven’t even gotten to the flights and lodging.

The average prices for hotel rooms in Vegas over Super Bowl weekend were $758 and $808. They were the highest room rates in continental U.S. history; and again, we’re just talking about the average prices for Saturday and Sunday.

It’s likely that Sanders’ hotel bill was thousands of dollars as well. Roundtrip plane tickets for her family of five probably cost thousands, too.

Again, who was paying for this?!

Reporters tried to answer the question for weeks, only to be stonewalled at every turn. Talking Points Memo says Sanders’ office didn’t respond to any inquiries about the matter.

That is, until Wednesday, when a spokesperson told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette Sarah and her husband, Bryan, paid their own way.

But excuse us if that sounds a little fishy. As Arkansas governor, Sanders’ annual salary is $158,749. That’s a nice living, but not nearly enough to afford a luxury Super Bowl getaway.

The weekend almost certainly cost a whole lot more than that!

One way journalists and concerned citizens often find out about the spending habits of their elected officials is through Freedom of Information Act requests. But Sanders altered Arkansas’ FOIA laws last fall, making it more difficult to access information.

The politico nepo baby called a special legislative session to change the FOIA laws, and ultimately signed a bill shielding her persona security records from the public. But it’s worth pointing out she originally wanted to go a lot further.

Sanders’ desire for secrecy was so extreme, the Republican-dominated state legislature rejected her first two attempts to change the rules.

“We had the most eclectic and diverse group of Arkansans show up to oppose that bill that I have ever witnessed in 40 years of political involvement,” said Nate Bell, a former state legislator.

This is far from the first time that Sanders’ spending has come under scrutiny, and she’s only been governor for roughly 14 months. Up until this point, her biggest grift was buying a nearly $20,000 podium ($19,029.25, to be exact).

An enterprising investigative reporter discovered the lectern was purchased with state funds, only for Sanders’ office to blame the documentation on an “accounting error.” The state wasn’t reimbursed until mid-September, despite the podium being purchased in June.

Also, the podium wasn’t delivered until August. (Arkansas’ audit of the curious purchase is expected to be completed by the end of March, after months of investigating.)

It wouldn’t be out of the ordinary for Sanders to bill Arkansas taxpayers for frivolous expenses. Last summer, the gay-hating governor took a break from attacking LGBTQ+ people to go on a taxpayer-funded European vacation.

The trip was billed as an “overseas trade mission,” though it’s uncertain what kind of international trade mission would apply to Sanders’ duties as governor.

But one of those duties appears to be throwing rockin’ football tailgates! Sanders billed her taxpaying constituents $13,000 last September for a college football kickoff party, documents show.

Meanwhile, Sanders continues to drive her state further into the ground. Just last week, the supposedly pro-life politician rejected expanding postpartum Medicaid coverage from 60 days to 12 months. Arkansas had the highest known rate of maternal mortality in the U.S. from 2018 to 2020, according to the CDC.

Last year, Arkansas abruptly removed more than 400,000 people from the Medicaid roles as well.

There’s no money for poor people’s healthcare, but plenty of cash for football parties and exorbitantly expensive podiums. If there were a Super Bowl of grifting, Sanders would undoubtedly be the favorite.

No word on how pricey tickets would be.

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