For Immediate Release
Thursday, August 4th,  2022

Contact: Josselyn Berry, Jberry@azdem.org

ADP Statement On the Results of the GOP Gubernatorial Primary

PHOENIX– The Arizona Gubernatorial race has finally been called and Kari Lake is officially the Republican nominee for governor.

“This bitter primary race that fractured the Republican Party on a local and national level has finally come to an end and the result is a nominee who has taken an extreme position on abortion, elections, guns and more. Arizona is at a crossroads with this election and the next governor needs to be ready on day one to tackle serious issues like rising cost of living, our drought, addressing our school funding crisis and teacher shortage and more,”  said Raquel Terán, Chair of the Arizona Democratic Party. “It’s clear from this primary that Kari Lake utterly and completely fails to meet this moment. We need a governor with a vision and one who will fight for Arizona, and Lake is not that governor.”

Read Below for More Background on Kari Lake’s Extreme Agenda 

• Fealty to the Trump Agenda, not Arizonans- It’s clear Kari Lake has always been out to win the approval of Donald Trump–Arizona voters not so much. She’s spewed out a consistent stream of 2020 election conspiracy theories and has been sowing the idea that if she loses the primary it’s due to fraud.
• Lake Is So Obsessed With The 2020 Election That She Said It’s the Single Most Important Issue In Arizona Over Immigration, Water, and the Economy–Lake often states “election integrity” is her “number one priority,” stating that “if we don’t have a fair election, nothing else matters.” Lake has said the sort of things that “don’t matter” if she doesn’t address “election integrity,” are basic governance issues for Arizona like education, taxes, and fixing Arizona’s water shortage.
• Kari Lake is an Abortion Radical Against Most Exceptions and Supports Criminalizing Doctors–Lake has said she is 100% pro-life, suggesting she opposes exceptions for rape, incest, and the life of the mother, and has referred to abortion as murder. When asked if she supported exceptions for rape and incest, Lake said: “I don’t believe that any child should be killed in a mother’s womb” and that “life is sacred and you don’t mess with what God wants.” Lake backs Arizona’s pre-statehood, century-plus-old abortion ban, which does not have exceptions for rape or incest, and criminalizes providers who perform abortion punishable by two to five years in prison.
• Lake Is An Extreme Supporter Of Gun Rights, Even Entertaining Introducing Dangerous Weapons Like Rocket Launchers To The Public–Lake has pledged not to sign any new gun safety legislation in Arizona if elected governor, and in fact she wants to roll back what already exists in the state. Lake opposed red flag laws, which help keep guns from domestic abusers.  One of Lake’s few concrete policy proposals is a plan to eliminate the sales tax for gun and ammo purchases, making deadly weapons cheaper to purchase. In a video, Lake even entertained the possibility that ownership of rocket launchers was covered by the second amendment.