Capitol Media Services
PHOENIX -- The head of the Arizona National Guard is quitting.
But Adjutant General Kerry Muehlenbeck said it's not because she's unhappy with the job or being the head of the Department of Emergency and Military Affairs under Gov. Katie Hobbs.
She actually was one of the few agency chiefs named by former Gov. Doug Ducey that Hobbs kept on after taking office in 2023. In fact, she will be the first to leave of her own volition, with others forced out over internal issues or their inability to get confirmed by the Senate. Instead, Muehlenbeck told Capitol Media Services, the time has come -- literally -- for her to go back to her old job of teaching criminal justice studies at Mesa Community College. That's because federal law requires civilian employers to keep someone's job open for up to five years while they are serving in the military. And that five years, she said, is up this year.
Her departure, though, sets the stage for Hobbs having to choose a replacement. More to the point, that person will have to survive what has become an intense grilling at the hands of the Senate Committee on Director Nominations, a panel formed specifically to screen the picks of the new governor. Any questions for her replacement, not expected to be named until Muehlenbeck leaves in June, are likely to depend on who the governor picks. But Sen. Jake Hoffman, who heads that committee, said it will come down to ensuring that person can do the job necessary.
"We're in an age where we want our military men and women, whether that's the Guard or whether that's the Marines and the Army, we want them to be the most efficient, effective fighting force possible,'' said the Queen Creek Republican. And everything else, he said, is pretty much irrelevant.
"Woke ideology of the politicization of our men and women will be an automatic death knell for any Hobbs nominee for this important post,'' said Hoffman.
There also is the fact that Republican legislators have attempted over the years to insert themselves into the activities of the Arizona National Guard -- what they can and cannot do -- even though, by law, the adjutant general and the approximately 8,000 soldiers in the state's Army and Air National Guard report to the governor who is the commander.
In an extensive interview, Muehlenbeck said what she did -- and whatever whoever succeeds her must do -- is understand the nature of the post.
"I get that my job is political,'' she said, being a gubernatorial appointee. "What I have been trying to let people know is, I think at its core, it's still nonpartisan.''
Muehlenbeck said that Hobbs, in keeping her on even though she was a Ducey appointee, understood that. And what of times when there were disagreements with the governor?
"I'd never second guess her,'' Muehlenbeck said. The key, she said, is understanding what is the direction in which the governor and her team wants to go.
"My job is to give them certain options,'' Muehlenbeck said. So that, she said, might be providing three paths "to get up the mountain'' and tell the governor which one she recommends. But the governor gets the last word.
Muehlenbeck, who has been in the military her entire career since college -- she went directly into the Air Force as a lieutenant and now has the rank of major general -- said that comes naturally to those in uniform.
"In the military, you don't take any of the decisions personal,'' she said.
"You're there to provide your best military advice,'' Muehlenbeck continued. "And if I don't agree inside the room where we're having discussions, as soon as we walk out of the door, then that decision is the best one we could have made.''
While the law makes the governor the commander of the Guard with the adjutant general as the director of DEMA, all that is not absolute.
Title 10 of the U.S. Code allows the president to order the National Guard into federal service. That can include everything from oversea deployment to combat zones to missions like aiding with natural disasters or helping with law enforcement. At that point they are subject to federal laws and regulations and have active duty status. That hasn't stopped Arizona lawmakers from trying to impose their own restrictions. For example, Sen. Wendy Rogers has proposed a state law to say the Arizona guard cannot be called into active duty combat unless there is a declaration of war by Congress. The Flagstaff Republican pushed a similar measure last year.
While it cleared the Senate, it ran into problems in the House after lawmakers were warned that it would tell the Department of Defense was unwilling to go overseas and perform missions there. More to the point, it would have stripped the Guard of $636 million in federal funds -- more than 96% of its budget -- as well as its federally supplied equipment ranging from aircraft to trucks. Rogers, undeterred, is back again this year with her SB 1495. Like last year, it was approved by the Senate and now awaits House action.
Muehlenbeck, for her part, said it would be wrong to say that Arizona Guard soldiers should only be deployed for in-state missions. She said it comes down to the nature of the Guard -- and that fact that members are trained to fight the nation's wars.
"We are able to leverage that training, that skills, the equipment we use to now go and help in terms of state response,'' Muehlenbeck said. It's precisely for that reason, for example, that the Arizona Guard has Blackhawk helicopters.
There also has been an ongoing dispute of the role Guard soldiers should be playing on the border. In prior years, troops have provided support services to free up federal border officers as well as help stem the flow of drugs. Now soldiers work with customs officers at the border to help search vehicles for illegal drugs. But some GOP lawmakers want them to take an active role in actually capturing illegal border crossers. As to what advice she would give her successor, Muehlenbeck said she found that the best way to build the readiness was instead to "build people.''
"And then the people do the rest,'' she said.
"So I think my only advice would be, focus on the people, take care of the people,''
Muehlenbeck said. "If you can build strong and resilient people, they will follow you just about anywhere and they will do amazing things in the face of really extreme danger.''
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