LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (KeynoteUSA) — A prosecutor said Friday he will not file any criminal charges over the purchase of a $19,000 lectern by Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ office that drew national scrutiny .
An audit found the purchase potentially violated state laws on procurement, state property and government records. But Pulaski County Prosecutor Will Jones said that after a “thorough review of the report and supporting documents,” his office determined that “criminal charges are not warranted.”
There is “insufficient evidence of criminal conduct,” Jones said in a letter Friday to Auditor Roger Norman.
Norman said in an email that he had no comment.
Alexa Henning, a spokeswoman for the governor, said Jones’ review confirmed what the governor’s office had said all along.
“We followed the law, reimbursed the state for private funds, and this was nothing more than a ridiculous controversy manufactured by the far left,” Henning said in an email statement.
The lectern for Sanders, who was former President Donald Trump’s press secretary and has been widely viewed as a potential candidate to be his running mate, has drawn attention from late-night host Jimmy Kimmel to The New York Times.
The blue, wood-paneled lectern was purchased last June with a state credit card for $19,029.25 from an events company in Virginia. The Arkansas Republican Party reimbursed the state for the purchase on Sept. 14, and Sanders’ office called the use of the state credit card an accounting error. Sanders’ office said he received the lectern in August.
Similar music stand models are listed online for $7,500 or less.
Arkansas lawmakers last year approved the request to review the lectern purchase. The subsequent audit said Sanders’ office potentially illegally manipulated public records when the words “to be reimbursed” were added to the lectern’s original invoice after the state Republican Party paid it in September.
Jones said Friday that the executive assistant who made that notation did not “knowingly ‘make a false entry or falsely alter any public record,’ nor delete, delete, delete, destroy or conceal a public record.”
“Further, there is insufficient evidence to demonstrate that the notation was added for the ‘purpose of impairing the truthfulness, readability, or availability of a public record,'” Jones said.
Sanders’ office and auditors questioned whether the governor and other constitutional officials are subject to the purchasing and property rules she was accused of violating. The audit said the governor’s office did not follow steps set out in state law for agencies to dispose of state property.
Jones said Arkansas law is unclear as to whether provisions of the General Budget and Accounting Procedures Act apply to constitutional officers. He pointed to different interpretations of the law by auditors and the Arkansas Governor’s Office.
“Given the multiple interpretations of the GABPL and the ambiguity over whether it applies to the AGO, there is insufficient evidence to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the statute was knowingly violated,” the letter said.
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