State Treasurer Kimberly Yee (R-AZ) is threatening to sue Tom Horne after the fellow Republican candidate claimed she sat on a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) committee, something she says never happened.
Treasurer Yee, who is running for Arizona Superintendent of Public Education, the position Horne currently holds, sent a cease-and-desist letter to Horne on Tuesday, demanding he remove the accusation from his campaign website.
At the center of the dispute is a claim Horne made at an April Republican committee meeting, where he alleged that Yee had served on a DEI committee through the National Association of State Treasurers.
His campaign later posted the accusation online, and a campaign affiliate amplified it on social media. Yee denies it entirely.
"Let me be clear: that is a lie," she wrote, adding that the DEI committee allegation was "glaringly absent" from official documentation because "it never happened."
Supporting Claims
To back her position, Yee's legal team included a letter from the Chief Operating Officer of the National Association of State Treasurers, which outlines the committees she actually served on, none of which included a DEI committee.
Her attorneys argue the claim is not simply an opinion, but a false statement of fact that damaged her professional reputation, and warned that continued publication could lead to a defamation lawsuit with potentially significant financial consequences for Horne's campaign.
Far from supporting DEI, Yee says she has spent years fighting it. "I have been a vocal opponent of DEI, worked with our Republican majority in the Legislature to pass bills fighting it, and led a coalition of State Treasurers in combating the implementation of woke DEI policies," she said.
Additionally, she co-signed a letter to Fortune 1000 executives urging major companies to abandon their DEI programs entirely.
In a public statement, Yee called Horne's claim a deliberate lie and contrasted her record with what she described as a history of scandals surrounding him, including past FBI investigations and allegations of misconduct.
Horne has not yet publicly responded to the cease-and-desist letter.
Both candidates are competing in the Republican primary for Arizona Superintendent of Public Education, a race that shapes education policy for the state's public school students.
