Donald Trump

Ex-Sheriff Joe Arpaio, Pardoned by Trump, Wants His Old Job Back

Last year, Arpaio lost a primary race for the U.S. Senate to Rep. Martha McSally, R-Ariz., who went on to be elected in November

Joe Arpaio, the tough-guy former sheriff of Maricopa County, Arizona, announced that he's running for his old job on Sunday, exactly two years after President Donald Trump pardoned him for a federal contempt-of-court conviction, NBC News reports.

"Watch out world! We are back!" Arpaio, 87, said in a statement in which he promised to reinstate the extreme measures that made him famous, like housing immigrants in outdoor tents in the 100-degrees-plus temperatures of the Phoenix area.

Arpaio was defeated for re-election to what would have been a record seventh term as sheriff in November 2016, shortly after he was charged with contempt of court for having ignored a federal judge's order to stop arresting immigrants solely on suspicion that they were in the country illegally.

Arpaio, who was one of the first elected officials to endorse Trump's presidential campaign, was convicted in July 2017. The next month, Trump pardoned him, saying he admired Arpaio's work "protecting the public from the scourges of crime and illegal immigration."

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