By Howard Fischer
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PHOENIX — A state senator who complained about Democrats hosting a “drag story hour” has lost his privileges to use Senate broadcast facilities after he used them to do an interview with a talk show host who denies the Holocaust.

The move comes five days after Sen. Anthony Kern, R-Glendale, appeared on the Stew Peters show to talk about the April 30 event in a basement meeting room of the House. Speaker Ben Toma later revoked the privileges of Democrats to use meeting rooms, saying he was misled about what they were planning.

But that came after Kern called out the speaker for failing to take action. Both are running for Congress from the same district.

And then Kern used Peters’ show blast the House speaker.

“If he didn’t know, one, that does show incompetence,” Kern told Peters in the May 1 podcast. “Two, they lied to him,” Kern said, something the speaker should have known.

On Monday, Petersen reacted to Kern’s use of the broadcast center located in the Senate and staffed with Senate-paid workers.

“The Senate president does not approve of how the senator chose to use legislative broadcast resources last week,” said a spokeswoman for Petersen. “As a result, his privileges to use those resources for future interviews have been revoked.”

Petersen declined to say whether his decision to revoke Kern’s privileges was because of what he was saying or with whom he was talking, referring that question to Petersen.

“It’s a sad day,” Kern told Capitol Media Services of the action. But he declined to answer questions of whether he believes he did anything wrong in using a government facility to do an interview with someone who has declared Adolph Hitler a hero and has been openly anti-semitic.

During the show, Kern referred to the story hour as a “perv show.” And Peters claimed the event included children, which is not true.

Peters also took some shots directly at Toma.

“Is Ben Toma a pedophile? Is he a groomer?” he said to his audience before he linked in with Kern, saying the speaker is either incompetent or “with the pedophiles.”

Kern has been a controversial figure. He was at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 — he boasted about that on Peters’ show — and has called reports of a riot there that day “a sham.”

Kern also used his position as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee to launch a probe in February against Attorney General Kris Mayes, saying there has been “a flood of questionable activity” from her office. Kern said that includes a “witch hut” against local elected officials for the votes they have taken, a reference to her decision to prosecute two Cochise County supervisors for delaying certification of the 2022 election results.

More recently, Mayes obtained an indictment against Kern and 10 other “fake electors” on various charges including fraud and forgery for signing a statement claiming that Donald Trump won the 2020 election in Arizona — he actually lost to Joe Biden by 10,117 votes — and that they were the electors whose votes should be counted.