After throwing up a Nazi salute at a Deer Valley Unified School District governing board meeting last month — a gesture that brought immediate backlash and countless negative news articles — board member Kim Fisher had to know the next school board meeting would be a rough one for her.
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Instead, Fisher remained as recalcitrant as ever. Facing calls for her to step down from her post, Fisher refused and stormed out of a board meeting Tuesday evening.
“Recall, go ahead,” Fisher yelled at jeering attendees while she packed up her bag and began to leave.
The Deer Valley board oversees 42 schools and more than 32,000 students throughout north Phoenix, Glendale, Peoria, Anthem, New River and Queen Creek, according to the district’s website. Fisher initially joined the board in 2014 and her current term ends in January 2029.
During the public comment portion of a tense hour-and-a-half board meeting, more than a dozen community members called on Fisher over the fascist gesture she made at the tail end of the board’s previous meeting on May 26. Fisher had wanted to move the date of a long-range planning meeting about school boundaries, but board president Paul Carver shut her down and adjourned the meeting.
Seemingly in protest, Fisher raised her right arm in a Nazi salute, tossing in a “heil” or two for good measure. In a Facebook Live video filmed after the meeting, Fisher defended herself, saying Carver was “behaving like a dictator” and “all I could think of was Hitler, so I said, ‘Heil’ or whatever.” The episode ignited a media firestorm, and on Tuesday night, community members called her actions “disrespectful” and “inexcusable.” More than 70 others in the room clapped in support.
“No child in DVUSD will feel safe until you resign,” said an attendee named Brian Zuckerberg. “It needs to happen right now.” Adam Korman, a teacher in the district, said Fisher’s gesture was a “harsh reminder” that hate “still exists today.” Aaron Arnold, a teacher at Barry Goldwater High School, said Jewish students would be “alienated by this inexcusable incident.”
Jen Lazano, an organizer with the activist group Common Defense, brought a Barbie folder that contained the board’s oath of office, a self-evaluation form and a “simple” drafted resignation letter that’s “ready for you to sign today,” she told Fisher. Later in the meeting, a staff member attempted to hand Fisher the document, who frowned, shook her hand and mouthed, “No.”
When it was Fisher’s time to address community concerns at the end of the meeting, she didn’t back down. With a poster that read “Board Member Ethics” on the wall behind her, Fisher defended her Nazi salute and lashed out at the local teachers’ union in a six-minute rant. She said local members of the Arizona Education Association, Democrats and the media were “spreading hate” and “using” and “exploiting” the Jewish community by criticizing her gesture. She claimed that people jumped to condemn her because she supported President Donald Trump and is a Christian, an assertion that was met with boos and uncomfortable chuckles. She doubled down on calling Carver — also a conservative like Fisher — a “dictator.”
“My action was nothing more than calling out the dictatorship that we have been dealing with, not just for one meeting, but for three and a half years,” Fisher said. “Everybody knows it. It was not against any population.”
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She said she “apologized,” but only “if they felt hurt” and not because “there was any intent.” She added that “the important thing y’all miss is the biggest y’all hate me for: my faith in Jesus Christ,” eliciting widespread groans and jeers from the crowd. Shortly after, Carver cut Fisher’s microphone — she’d gone over her allocated time.
After Fisher stormed off, the other members of the council condemned Fisher’s behavior. Board member Stephanie Simacek, who initially called on the board to censure Fisher, apologized to the community for not standing up to Fisher at the time of her salute. Simacek also called on Fisher to resign because “censure alone is not enough.” Carver also said that “the right thing to do is to walk away and let the county superintendent replace you,” but that Fisher “thrives off of negative attention and hate.”
Board member Steve Bottfeld said the board didn’t react when Fisher made that “stupid salute” because “we were all shocked,” adding that “it scared the hell out of me.”
Simacek also called on her constituents to recall Fisher by filing a petition with the Maricopa County Superintendent of Public Instruction. Elected officials have very little power to actually remove her from her position. Instead, a recall election led by Fisher’s constituents could force her to stand for election before completing their term.
However, a successful recall election is a tough process. Petitioners must gather signatures equal to or greater than 25% of the number of votes cast for that office in the previous election, divided by the number of offices being filed.
“It’s a mountain to recall somebody,” DVUSD Superintendent Curtis Finch, whom Fisher has repeatedly attacked personally, said at the close of the meeting. “It’s probably a hundred grand minimum, that’s what the data says. And it’s only happened once in the history of Arizona, and it’s designed that way. The legislature does that on purpose, and so it’s a lot of work, and they want to discourage you to do that. So that’s why no one does it.”
Such an effort would have to gather more than 23,000 signatures in favor of recalling Fisher in 120 days to force a recall election. In 2024, 45,329 people voted Fisher into office. As of Tuesday, no recall petition for Fisher’s seat has been filed, although it appeared there was momentum to do so in the room Tuesday night.
“It’s going to take a concerted effort, if you’re deciding to climb that mountain. It’s a tough one,” Finch said. “But it can be done with a little cooperation and collaboration.”
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