As her election challenge lawsuit moves toward likely summary dismissal, Kari Lake is inching closer and closer to explicit calls for violence to her followers who refuse to accept her electoral loss. At Turning Point USA AmeriFest 2022 event in Phoenix Kari Lake made some incendiary remarks:
“Former television newscaster and failed Republican candidate for governor Kari Lake hinted at violence to a crowd of thousands of conservative activists Sunday, continuing her claim that she had really won last month.
““On Nov. 8, they committed highway robbery,” she said, to chants of “Kari! Kari!”
Lake, who has sued elections administrators alleging fraud, called the Maricopa County elections system a “house of cards” that she promised to take down. “I’m not just going to knock that house of cards over. We’re going to burn it to the ground,” she said. “They messed with the wrong woman. They messed with the wrong movement, of ‘we the people.’ And we’re not going to take it anymore.”
She then told the crowd that the Second Amendment – the right to bear arms – was in danger because of current leadership, and that that amendment protected all the others.
“You do not steal our vote and get away with it. You don’t,” she added.
Lake, borrowing a tactic of former President Donald Trump, attacked the news media, urging the audience to turn around and boo the “mainstream media” on a riser.
“Their days are numbered,” she said.
It was unclear whether she knew that the people she was insulting were actually a production crew for Turning Point USA, the event organizer.
Lake spent much of her remarks claiming the election had been stolen from her. “They had to steal our vote in broad daylight,” she said. “My pronouns are by the way: I won.””
Lake is coming very close to calling publicly for violence against her opponents and Arizona officials. She is using violent imagery and exhortations such as “burn it to the ground” (it being our electoral system in Maricopa and elsewhere in AZ, presumably) explicitly claiming that someone, somehow “stole our vote“, falsely claiming that Hobbs threatens Arizonans right to bear arms, and flatly and baselessly claiming that “I won“.
If Lake is not yet explicitly calling for violence, she is standing on the brink of doing so, and is certainly using rhetoric that is designed elicit a violent rage in her supporters. She is clearly courting violence against victorious democrats and election officials.
That’s her First Amendment right, but it does not protect her from the criticism of her fellow citizens. Every person who believes in democracy over fascism should let her know her behavior will not be tolerated, especially those Republicans out there who believe in our democracy and our norms of civil political behavior.
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The Independent adds some new details, “Kari Lake calls herself ‘proud election-denying deplorable’ in ranting speech”, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/kari-lake-arizona-republican-deplorable-speech-b2248256.html
Unsuccessful Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake gave a ranting speech this weekend in which she labelled herself a “proud election-denying deplorable” before urging young supporters to procreate and calling Anthony Fauci an “evil elf.”
“I know that right now we can identify as anything we want to identify as, but I want you to know that I identify as a proud election denying deplorable,” she told a heavily Millenial and Gen-Z crowd. “Are you with me?”
She added: “My pronouns are: I won.”
[S]he warned any young people who hoped to follow her own footsteps into journalism not to “become a fake news propagandist [like she was for over 20 years], or I might have to come and go to battle with you.
“I will do that,” she said. “I will. I don’t care how old I am. If I find out anybody in this crowd becomes a fake news propagandist, I might even be in a walker, and I will come at you and I will make you part of a viral video and you will regret it.”
Lake also veered into vaccine territory, calling Dr Fauci an “evil elf” before urging young conservatives to political – and bizarrely personal – action.
“I want all the girls to just scour this crowd, put your head on a swivel here and see if you can find that Prince Charming out there. Maybe wave to him,” she said. “This is such an opportunity to meet somebody that you can connect with at a deep spiritual level, right? And I want you to talk to the guys out there. If you’re a guy out there, grab this moment and ask that beautiful girl for her phone number. This is your chance. Ask her for her phone number. I don’t want to have any more pressure. But truly, the future of this country is resting on you and the families that you create. It is that important.”
[White Christian Nationalism and the Great Replacement Theory is what this was all about. ‘We need more white babies!’]
It’s just a big grift on the MAGOT morons…dont forget who she’s imitating! Gotta get that money while there are still people stupid enough to send it!
Kari Lake seems determined to get herself indicted. Maybe she wants to be some sort of martyr. Either that or she’s just nuts.
@Curt – it’s not as if those things are mutually exclusive. She could be multitasking and both want to be indicted and be nuts.
After directing the audience to the media in the back of the room, LaKKKe made an obscene gesture at them and held her pose for the cameras.
So classy!
It was an ugly moment from an ugly, hateful person.
One way to succeed in life is to find someone who has succeeded in the things you want to succeed in, and copy what they did.
LaKKKe is copying a two time popular vote loser with a long history of failed businesses, bankrupt casinos, and marriages.
I think she should keep that up.
Hmm. The Former Guy just got a referral to the DOJ for inciting insurrection, and I don’t see much difference between his rhetoric and that of The Former Candidate. Are we sure she’s coloring inside the legal lines here?