44 MEGALOPOLITAN LIFE education options. This year, the program hit a series of bumps. Previous reporting has revealed account holders have spent public education money to buy diamond necklaces, Lego sets, iPhones, widescreen TVs and Kenmore appliances. Then a May report by the Arizona Auditor General revealed just how deep those problems run — and how much state money is rushing out the door. As a result of a December 2024 policy change that auto- matically processed transactions under $2,000, nearly 2.3 million purchases were processed without so much as a preliminary review. Only 6.5% of those were actually audited afterward, pointing to potential misuse of more than $86,000 from those transactions alone. i i i BEST FAIR-WEATHER FRIEND RUBEN GALLEGO Senator Ruben Gallego wasn’t at the friend- ship-bracelet-wearing level with former California Rep. Eric Swalwell, but we could imagine the pair dominating the beer pong table. Swalwell called Arizona’s junior senator his best friend in Congress. The two lawmakers and their families vacationed together. Gallego chaired Swalwell’s 2020 presidential campaign, and the two men shared a short-lived PAC. Alas, their friend- ship collapsed in April after Swalwell was accused of sexual harassment and predatory behavior. Gallego initially defended Swal- well, only to retract that statement as the allegations intensified. Gallego said Swalwell lied to him, his personal loyalty clouded his judgment and Swalwell was unfit to serve in Congress. Whether it was genuine disgust for Swalwell’s behavior or nakedly saving his own political future, Gallego distanced himself from his former friend. Just two months later, Gallego similarly withdrew his previously vocal support of former Maine Senate hopeful Graham Platner following allegations of sexual assault. The man at least knows when to bail. BEST DOG AND PONY SHOW KRISTI NOEM’S PRESS CONFERENCE Rumors flew when then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced she’d be making a trip to Maricopa County in early February. Election deniers jeered, thinking she’d be heading a federal seizure of county voting records, and election administrators clamored online to make clear that no such raid was underway. On a Friday morning, more than a dozen reporters showed up to Phoenix’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office to see what her visit was about. ICE agents then shuffled reporters into vans and drove 30 minutes north to an undisclosed location: Homeland Security Investigations’ office at the Scotts- dale Airport. Once there, reporters waited yet again until Noem finally showed up to a small conference room to give a vapid press conference hating on Arizona’s elections and pushing for the SAVE Act, a federal bill that aims to implement voter ID rules that Arizona essentially already has passed. Reporters’ questions of “Why are we here?” to Noem went unanswered. i i i BEST COMEBACK MEASLES In 1912, the year Arizona became a state, the federal government began tracking a disease known to public health officials as one of the world’s most contagious. And in that first decade of tracking, measles killed an average of 6,000 people a year, a horrifying crisis. Infected people experience a high fever, runny nose and a red, splotchy rash — and potentially fatal complications in the brain and lungs. The tide changed with develop- ment of the two-dose measles-mumps- rubella vaccine, and early in the 21st century the Centers for Disease Control and Preven- tion announced that the disease had been eliminated. Now, dammit, we’re back in the dark years. Increased vaccine skepticism, fueled by fundamental science ignorance