In interview, AZ governor candidate Kari Lake says 'I don't have faith' in election system

Republican candidate for Arizona governor Kari Lake touted her plans to secure the border, expand trade skills training for high schoolers and reform elections in a 30-minute televised interview on Sunday.

The interview, filmed Saturday at the studios of AZTV7 in Phoenix, was the culmination of weeks of back-and forth-over whether Arizona's two gubernatorial candidates, Lake and Democratic nominee Katie Hobbs, would meet on a debate stage.

Hobbs has refused to do so, and Lake has not let voters forget — bringing up the issue in the first minute of her interview, saying Hobbs "was not courageous enough to show up."

Instead of a debate, Lake fielded questions from Mike Broomhead, a conservative commentator who hosts a show on Phoenix talk radio station KTAR. He opened by asking about elections, saying it was the topic most people asked about in questions submitted to the Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission, which sponsors the two-decade-old debate series.

Lake said she would work with the Legislature to clean up the voter rolls, citing concerns that voters were receiving multiple ballots, and reiterated her distrust of ballot counting machines, or tabulators. When Broomhead asked if Lake would end early voting, Lake didn't answer. She previously joined an unsuccessful lawsuit filed by the Arizona GOP to end the practice.

Lake, the former Fox 10 news anchor who has cast doubt on elections and claimed falsely that Trump won in 2020, said she was not confident this election would be fair.

"We're seeing problem after problem," she said, pinning those problems to her opponent, Hobbs, who is the state's elections chief and who last week confirmed 6,000 voter records needed review to ensure the right ballot was sent. "I wish I could sit here and say I have complete faith in the system, I don't have faith in the system. And that's why I'm going to work with lawmakers to come up with a way that we have secure elections."

With that in mind, Broomhead asked how Lake or any Republican could be confident in the outcome of the election, even if she wins.

"We've got to vote in droves and we have to send a very loud and clear message that we do want honest elections, we do want a secure border," Lake said. "So you have to get out and vote, and I believe that we can out-vote some of the problems if we just show up."

It's similar to language Lake used after her August primary victory, when she was asked to reconcile her pre-election claims that there was "stealing going on."

Broomhead didn't ask Lake about the outcome of the 2020 presidential election, which Lake has repeatedly said was corrupt, stolen and a result she would not have certified as governor. None of a series of lawsuits nor the Arizona Senate Republicans' review of Maricopa County ballots have produced evidence to prove the claim.

Lake: 'This isn't about me, it's about us'

Lake's bid to replace Republican Gov. Doug Ducey is an outsider's one: She has no elected experience, but she's used that as a boon, centering her populist campaign on Arizonans who want to see change.

"This isn't about me, it's about us," she said. "It's about Arizona and we've got some serious problems. We're tired of career politicians and bureaucrats messing things up, not solving the problems and prolonging some of the issues that we shouldn't even have to be dealing with today."

Lake highlighted her plans to work with the Legislature to prevent cities from taxing groceries and rent, backfilling revenue losses with state funds from future budget surpluses, and create dual-track education programs that would allow students who aren't headed toward college to pursue technical training. Paying for new programs and backfilling $400 million in city revenue losses could get more complicated in future years, as the Joint Legislative Budget Committee has projected a significant decline in surpluses.

More beds, more arrests: Kari Lake's plan for homelessness echoes Trump administration

She wouldn't take a firm stance on which of two conflicting abortion laws she'd like to see in effect, a near-total ban first written in 1864 or a 15 week ban passed this year, or what abortion policies she might sign into law. She said she was "pro-life" and, asked if she supported exceptions for pregnancies resulting from rape and incest, said she believed those were in the 15-week ban and "the real death sentence should go to the person who rapes."

The 15-week ban does not include exceptions unless there is a medical emergency.

Despite her needling of Hobbs for not debating and fleeing reporters after an interview last week, Lake refused to take questions after filming her own interview.

"Katie Hobbs ran away, she ran away, I'm not running away I have another event," Lake told reporters who followed as she left. "I just answered 30 minutes of questions, and I spoke to you out here, and I answer questions every day from the fake news."

Lake has not answered a question from The Arizona Republic since late July.

Broomhead choice raised eyebrows

The interview added another chapter, potentially a final one, in the debate drama centered on the Arizona gubernatorial race, one of the tightest contests in the country and that public polls put at a tie.

Kari Lake's border 'invasion': Rhetoric resonates with some Latino voters

Broomhead makes no bones about his conservative beliefs, and has said he doesn't consider himself a journalist because he gets paid for his opinions. Clean Elections' decision that he should do the questions, after first asking several other journalists, raised eyebrows among Democrats.

“Katie Hobbs successfully took on tough questions about her comprehensive policy plans to tackle the state’s challenges dished out by a nonpartisan moderator, unfortunately Arizonans can expect a softball interview on Kari Lake’s terms once again,” said Josselyn Berry, spokesperson for the Arizona Democratic Party, said in a statement Sunday.

Broomhead said he consulted journalists at KTAR for help crafting an unbiased approach.

"I went into this knowing that I was asking questions on behalf of the voters in Arizona, so I didn't do it for Republican voters," he said after recording the interview. "I hope it comes across that way when people see it, because I really wanted to ask questions that voters wanted to hear."

Election guide: November 2022

City races | School boards | State | Governor
| Ballot measures | Federal races | How to vote

Hobbs has refused to debate Lake, whom Hobbs has accused of only trying to create a spectacle. Co-hosts the Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission and Arizona PBS, which is housed at Arizona State University, followed precedent scheduling an interview Lake, but that was abruptly canceled when Hobbs announced her own interview with the ASU-affiliated station.

Lake charged Arizona PBS with back-room deal making to support the Democratic candidate, and Clean Elections severed ties with Arizona PBS. The non-partisan commission partnered with AZTV to give Lake her question and answer session.

That aired Sunday, with just over two weeks until Election Day.

"This is different than what we were anticipating when we started this process three months ago," Clean Elections Executive Director Tom Collins said. "It's different to have a Q&A than it is to have a debate. Our goal is to make sure we get information out to voters."

Reach reporter Stacey Barchenger at stacey.barchenger@arizonarepublic.com or 480-416-5669. Follow her on Twitter @sbarchenger.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Kari Lake doubts election system, touts populist message in interview