Arkansas Senator Suspended Over Filing Frivolous Complaint

LITTLE ROCK, Ark.—An Arkansas state senator won’t have access to Senate offices and can’t participate in legislative meetings after the Senate on Tuesday ruled he made a frivolous ethics complaint against a fellow lawmaker in retaliation for sanctions he received earlier this year.

By a 26–4 vote, the majority-Republican Senate approved its ethics committee’s recommendation to suspend GOP Sen. Alan Clark for the rest of the 93rd General Assembly, which ends on Jan. 8.

The Senate earlier this month rejected a complaint Clark had filed against Democratic Sen. Stephanie Flowers accusing her of improperly receiving per diem payments for legislative meetings she attended via Zoom.

The ethics panel ruled that Clark had filed the complaint as retaliation after the Senate stripped him and another lawmaker of their leadership posts after Clark sought reimbursement for a meeting he didn’t attend.

“The committee felt that the comments and actions of Senator Clark, including bringing these ethics petitions for the purpose of retaliation, were bringing dishonor and disruption to the institution of the Senate,” Republican Sen. Kim Hammer, who chairs the ethics committee, told senators before the vote.

Clark didn’t attend Tuesday’s proceedings, citing a long-planned trip with his family and said his attorneys would not have been able to attend. The lawmaker accused the Senate of punishing a whistleblower with its vote.

“How can we be expected to fight corruption and wrongdoing in government if we can’t reveal and stand against our own questionable behavior?” Clark said in a statement via text message. “I am saddened for this body that I love, more than anything else.”

Rules the Senate adopted during the coronavirus pandemic allowed members to participate remotely, but not receive per diem funds. Flowers had not requested the payments and repaid the money in August after she realized she had received

*As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases